


Dragon Age: The War in the North, Book I: Rise and Fall of the Black Wardens

by Riddle_of_Strider



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medieval, Assassins & Hitmen, Assassins' Guild, City Elf Culture and Customs, City Elf Origin, Corypheus - Freeform, Dalish Elven Culture and Customs, Dalish Elves, Dark Fantasy, Denerim, Dragon Age Lore, Ferelden, Friends of Red Jenny, Gen, Grey Wardens, High Fantasy, History of Thedas, Kingdoms of Thedas, Mages and Templars, Spies & Secret Agents, The Coterie, The Elder One - Freeform, The Qun, Thedas, the carta
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-18
Updated: 2016-06-27
Packaged: 2018-06-03 02:39:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 27,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6593359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Riddle_of_Strider/pseuds/Riddle_of_Strider
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the south of Thedas, the brave men and women of the Inquisition are all that stand between the Elder One, Corypheus, and his mad quest for godhood.  Heroes and villains clash in epic battles, their names and deeds will be remembered in song for all of time. But in the north, beyond the reach of the Inquisition, a sleepless malice mobilizes the armies of darkness. The heroes that stand against it will wage their war in the shadows, their names and deeds unknown to history.  These are their stories.  This is the War in the North.</p>
<p>Feanor of Denerim is a hero of the Fifth Blight, yet no one remembers his name.  Disgraced and discharged from the Grey Wardens by the order's new commander, Feanor unites with his only friend, Zevran Arainai. Over ten years the two build a Thedas-spanning assassins guild that hunts the wicked and the unjust: The Black Wardens. The Inquisition's war is the last thing on their minds, but a sinister plot pulls the Black Wardens into the fray.  Once again, Feanor and Zevran find themselves on the front lines, fighting to save a world that will never thank them, and does not even know they exist.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Table for Three

_It was an easy choice, really: Conscription into the Wardens or the hangman’s noose for murdering a human noble right here in Denerim. Murder they called it…couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy. But staring across that field at a horde of Darkspawn, I almost wished I had gone for the noose. I watched the King of Ferelden die. I watched the Warden Commander die. I watched as the soldiers of the heroic Loghain Mac Tir heroically quit the field. After that, I didn’t stay to watch any more. I ran as fast and as far as my legs would carry me, but apparently fate had a hard on for me and threw me into the company of two more unlikely Warden survivors of Ostagar, Caoilainn Cousland and Alistair Theirin._

_The rest was a story fit for a fucking fairy tale. The triumphant defeat of the Archdemon by an unlikely band of rag-tag heroes, the ascension of King Alistair Theirin, long may he reign, his wedding to the beautiful Caoilainn Cousland, and the rebirth of the Ferelden Grey Wardens. Lovely sodding tale if ever there was one. Except…you see, I have a problem with authority (I don’t much care for it), and I have a problem with violence (apparently I care for it a tad too much), and I definitely, definitely, had a problem with our new Warden Commander: Caoilainn Cousland, or is it Queen Caoilainn Theirin? Before I could be brought up to speed on which titles were appropriate, she drummed me out of the Wardens. She said it was because I told her to go plough herself, but I think the real reason was that she found out I ran at Ostagar. Can’t say as I blame her for that, but some of us weren’t friends with giant eagles or whatever the hell plucked her and King Al from that tower._

_So what’s a disgraced Grey Warden with a penchant for violence and no marketable skills do when he finds himself with no line of work? I’ll tell you. He hooks up with his old mate from the Blight, who happens to be formerly of the Antivan Crows. (Yes, that’s him. That blonde-haired tall glass of water sitting to my left. Don’t let the charming smile and dreamy accent fool you: He’ll gut you as soon as bed you. Maybe he’ll do both. Actually, he probably will do both). What’s that? Oh, you’ve never heard of the Antivan Crows? Well lets suffice it to say that they’re an organization that makes problems go away. So my friend and I, we go into the problem-disappearing business for ourselves. And you know what? We’re good at it. So good we start getting a reputation for ourselves. So good we start attracting recruits. So good we even get our own name: The Black Wardens. Cheeky, right? And yes, the name’s meant to draw a bit of a dark parallel. But what was I saying…oh right, we’re so good that the aforementioned Antivan Crows don’t much care for the newfound competition. We’re so good that they put a mark out on us, and those three blokes over at that table are here to collect, but not a one of em is gonna walk out of here alive. By the way, the name’s Feanor, this here is Zevran. Nice to meet you, now might be a good time to duck out of here…_

The Antivan Crows were supposed to be the best. They weren’t. Not these three anyway. Feanor put a dagger right between one’s eyes from halfway across the room before any of them even moved. The second managed to get to his feet before Zevran crossed the space and impaled him. The third was actually able to draw his own weapon…before promptly dropping it and racing for the back door. Feanor watched with a grin of amusement as the door burst open right before the hapless would-be assassin reached it and a black-fletched arrow seemed to sprout from his chest. The Crow looked at it dumbly, then at the cloaked figure standing in the doorway before slumping to the floor. The whole bloody business had taken less than thirty seconds.  
“Rookies,” Zevran said dismissively with a shake of his head. He was already wiping the blood from his sword off on his victim’s tunic. Feanor shot his friend an askance grin as he casually walked across the room and wrenched his dagger from between the still open eyes of his man slumped against the wall.

“You always told me the Crows beat the ‘rookie’ out of you before you even touched the hilt of a dagger.”

“Well yes generally, that is the rule of thumb. But comparatively speaking, these three were definitely rookies. As in: they survived the initial beatings, got to hold their daggers, and then…well here we are.” 

Feanor laughed as he and Zev sheathed their weapons and began patting down the dead men for anything of value, specifically anything that pointed to the origin of this latest hit order. Feanor wasn’t hopeful. The Crows may have been sending green boys after them thus far, but their leadership was always careful to cover their tracks. The cyphers and codes that had been in use back in Zevran’s day had long since been changed. As Feanor and Zev finished up their quick search, the third man in their party closed the door behind him, regarded the man lying on the floor with an arrow in his chest for a moment before nocking another and shooting it point blank into the dead bastard’s genitals. 

“Maker damnit, Alderas!” Feanor said throwing his hands up in the air. “What did I tell you about that weird shit!?”

The archer pulled back the hood of his cloak, revealing the smiling face of a handsome young Elf with long chestnut brown hair. The giddy look on the youth’s face belied the gruesome act he had just committed.

“What? It’s my thing. You know, my calling card.”

Zevran shook his head. “Your choice of a calling card is macabre and disturbing my young friend, you should reconsider it.”

Alderas looked at Zevran with genuine confusion. “Why? The guy’s already dead. Not like he’s going to be using it.”

“You are entirely missing the point, Alderas,” Zevran said with an exasperated sigh. 

“The point being?”

“The point being that you don’t shoot a guy in his sodding cock!” Feanor yelled. “We’re professionals here and that kind of chicken shit just isn’t done! Tell him Zev!”

“It’s true. It just isn’t done. You can shoot, stab, slice or gouge anyone anywhere while they’re alive, but once they’re dead, you don’t touch the bits.” Zevran shrugged. “I don’t make up the rules, I just follow them.”

Feanor nodded in satisfaction and folded his arms across his chest as if Zevran’s commentary was law on the matter. Alderas just shrugged and rolled his eyes while slinging his bow across his back. “Fine,” he said, “No more cock shooting. I’m gonna have to come up with another calling card.” He strolled casually into the center of the room, looking at each of the dead men in turn as he did so. “Don’t suppose these ones turned up anything useful either?”

Feanor jingled a purse of silver coins, the only thing of worth that had turned up on the Crows, and shook his head. “Same old lot of nothing,” he said. “Coins and Crow cyphers, nothing we can make heads or tails of.”

The three Elves just looked at each other for a few moments, signs of worry beginning to show on their faces. It was Zevran who broke the uneasy silence: “Pretty soon they’re going to start sending more seasoned blades after us, this could get ugly rather quickly.”

“I’m hoping that’s a lead in to some brilliant and/or dastardly plan,” Feanor said.

“Well, next time the Crows send someone after us, perhaps it wouldn’t be a bad idea to…I don’t know…take one alive?”

Feanor raised a skeptical eyebrow at that. “The Crows don’t talk. What do you expect to get from them?”

Zevran’s normally cheerful and relaxed demeanor shifted ever so slightly to something darker, and his voice tinged with a coldness that seemed unnatural and alien coming from him. “I used to be a Crow. I know how to make them talk.”

Feanor and Alderas exchanged glances. Deep down, Zevran was a predator, but rare were the moments he showed his true colors. His companions both knew that whenever good old Zev went dark, a rabid Mabari was less dangerous by comparison. Feanor nodded slowly before answering. He himself had never been averse to torture as a means to a justifiable end, a character trait which during the Blight had often put him at odds with Ferelden’s oh-so-righteous future monarchs. But even he shuddered to think of whatever Zev had in store for the next Crow who drew the short straw to come after them. “Alright. We take one alive and see where that leads us. Now unless anyone wants to leave anymore calling cards, let’s get the hell out of here before this dump happens to get another patron.” Feanor, Zevran and Alderas pulled their hoods over their heads and ventured out the front door into the night. As Feanor passed the bar, he paused to wink and shoot a sadistic grin at the innkeeper cowering on the floor behind it. “No offense.”


	2. Beneath Denerim

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Meet the members of Denerim's Black Warden cell and learn their backstories.

Underneath the bustling streets of Denerim lay an immense network of tunnels, cisterns and caverns, some man-made and some natural, that composed the city’s extremely complex sewage and irrigation system. Water runoff trickled down hundreds of grates and manholes into the catacombs and collected into large pools only to be pumped back out into the fields of the city’s many surrounding farms. The tunnel system had been a perpetual work in progress for hundreds of years, each generation adding new passageways and aqueducts as older ones fell into disrepair, disuse, or were simply forgotten. It was amidst these older passageways and secluded caverns that the Black Wardens of Denerim made their home. One wrong turn and a man could get lost down there forever, but Feanor and Zevran had begun mapping the underground labyrinth nearly ten years ago, and now every Black Warden knew each twist and turn by heart.

_I know what you’re thinking. Really, I do. “If you all are doing so well, why are you living in a sewer?” Well there are a lot of reasons actually, let me fill you in on some of them. Reason one: You’re a smug fucking idiot if you think people in our line of work are too good to hold up in sewers and, like you, most people are smug fucking idiots. Reason two: The sewers underneath Denerim run for literally hundreds of miles in every direction and if you know them, which we do, you have literally hundreds of spots throughout the city you can pop in and out of completely unexpected. Reason three: Vice versa. If you don’t know them, which you don’t, and recall here that most people are exactly like you, you will get lost down here. And you will die, but probably not before the rats start eating you. Reason four: And this is the part that really does make the whole thing bearable, we’re rich. Really rich. Rich enough to make even a cistern in a sewer look like an arl’s palace. Trust me, I’ve been in several in my day. And the smell? Well you get used to that quicker than you’d think. It’s mostly just water run off down here anyway. Mostly. Now close your eyes, because we’ve reached the point where if you see which way I turn next, I’ll have to kill you. Wouldn’t want that, would we?_

 

The three Elves emerged from the tunnels into a massive natural cavern as big as any noble’s great hall and furnished with just as many amenities. Alcoves carved into the walls served as quarters for each of the cell’s members, and the cavern proper was lit by clusters of luminescent crystals and provided ample space for training and lounging about. Feanor let down his hood and tossed his rain soaked cloak aside, collapsing gratefully into one of many padded chairs at the communal table after what had been several long days hunting the Crow hit squad. He looked so innocent lounging in that chair. He was small and slight of build, even by Elvhen standards. He kept his head meticulously clean shaven, his dark hair never growing longer than a fine stubble. His face was truly beautiful with full lips and a perfect nose that had miraculously never been broken. His features might have been considered delicate if not for the perpetually hardened expression he had mastered over the years. His alabaster skin was crisscrossed with intricate facial tattoos in the Dalish style. Feanor was not Dalish, but his family had taken up the practice of the Vallaslin generations ago. They thickened considerably around his eyes, accentuating what was by far his most stunning feature: Eyes the color of polished emeralds that seemed to glow when the light hit them just right. 

But looking at those eyes long enough, a perceptive person would notice how cold, distant, and haunted they seemed. Once they noticed that, maybe they would notice that when those full lips curled into a smile, it was usually either sinister or devoid of mirth. Perhaps they would notice that the tattoos on his face extended down past his neck and under his collar, but they would not know that on his arms those tattoos wound into thorn covered vines, or that each of those thorns represented a life Feanor had taken. They would not know why he religiously shaved his head; that he had begun the practice years ago after seeing an Ogre grab a man by his long hair and rip his head clean off his shoulders. But maybe, just maybe, upon recognizing a few unsettling details about Feanor, a perceptive person would also recognize that his lithe frame was all muscle and sinew wound tight as a spring. That his hands were calloused and hard as stones. That under his cloak he always wore strange Drakeskin armor, light as leather and hard as steel. Maybe they would spy the handles of one or more of the dozen daggers and knives he kept on his person at all times. Maybe, just maybe they would recognize the kind of person Feanor was. But only if they looked at his brilliant green eyes long enough. 

_If you haven’t figured it out already, let’s get clear on one thing: We’re not the ‘good guys.’ We kill people for money, the absolute antithesis of ‘good guys.’ That doesn’t mean we don’t have some sense of morality though, we’re not the Crows. We don’t go around offing children and Chantry Sisters for bloated landlords and spoiled princelings. In fact, all of our targets in some way fall into the same category as ‘bloated landlords and spoiled princelings.’ Which is to say, they deserve what they get. Granted, our employers sometimes deserve the same or worse, but name me one business in which associating with unsavory characters doesn’t come with the territory and I’ll eat a live Nug. Besides, the beauty of it all is that given time, our ‘unsavory employers’ eventually end up as ‘unsavory targets’ themselves. It’s a beautiful system. It’s why we do what we do, and the Crows are trying to stop us from doing what we do. They hate the competition and they hate that our hit list often coincides with their clientele list. That’s why they’ve been trying to kill us, and they’ve succeeded against some of our cells in other cities. But as long as they keep coming after us, we’ll keep killing them right back. Because we aren’t going to stop doing what needs to be done._

As Feanor reclined in his chair, a large human male walked over with two mugs of steaming spiced wine in his hands, sat across from Feanor and slid one of the mugs over to him. Feanor nodded in thanks and took a sip, savoring the warmth that immediately spread to his limbs. The human was Quinn, and at fifty years old he was still as spry as a man half his age and the strongest human Feanor had ever met. He was built like a bear with broad shoulders, a barrel chest, and limbs as thick as tree branches. Feanor had once seen him snap a man’s spine just by squeezing him. Quinn had salt and pepper hair pulled back into a tight ponytail and a perpetual five o’clock shadow. What was most intimidating about him though was not his size, but his one empty eye socket covered by a patch of seared scar tissue that even Feanor found hard to look at, and he had seen some ugly shit in his day. Quinn knew the effect it had on people, which was why he chose not to wear an eyepatch and made a show of leering at whoever he was talking to out of his one still functioning eye. 

_Quinn’s story is pretty well representative of all Black Wardens. You see whereas the Crows buy or steal kids to shape into weapons, we take recruits who have been sharpened into weapons by life. And they have a way of finding us. Quinn for example, I actually met him years ago. He was born in the Free Marches and was a huntsman for some minor noble. The noble had several daughters, one of whom took a liking to Quinn, and he to her. One day they weren’t being quite careful enough and got caught tumbling in the hay. The kind-hearted noble made Quinn watch as he had his daughter flogged and then shipped off to the Chantry to live out her days in penance for loving a mere commoner. Then he put Quinn’s eye out with a hot poker and sentenced him to ten years in a penal Silverite mine. After he got out, he moved to Ferelden and bounced around from one band of mercenaries to another for a few years. During the Blight, the people of Redcliffe hired the crew he was riding with at the time to protect the town when things started going all tits up there. After one night of the dead coming after them, the whole merc band ran away. All except for Quinn, he stayed and fought, and that was where we met. After that I’m not sure what he did, but a few years ago when the Black was just starting to gain a real reputation, we were contracted to off a merchant smuggling lyrium-infused drugs. We ambushed the bastard on the road, and once the arrows started flying and a few of the hired guards dropped, the rest ran off. All except for one: big old Quinn. He remembered Zev and me from Redcliffe, and we remembered him. We offered him a chance to join us, he agreed. The merchant smuggler was Quinn’s first kill as a Black Warden. The second was the noble that put out his eye nearly twenty years prior._

Feanor nodded toward one of the alcoves where a Dwarf was bent over a large table covered in bottles and parchment, totally engrossed in his work, mumbling to himself as he jotted notes down on a scroll. While still stocky by most standards, he appeared to be rather thin for his race and eschewed the usual elaborate beard sported by most Dwarven men for a clean shaven face. His ashy-blonde cropped hair looked to be in need of a good washing. His grey eyes were bloodshot and had dark circles under them, and the small tattoo identifying him as casteless stood out in stark contrast to the Dwarf’s too-pale skin. Feanor asked Quinn; “How many days straight he been awake this time?”

The big man looked over at Brecca the Dwarf and shrugged, “Three I think.”

Feanor sighed and shook his head. Brecca had a bad habit of losing track of time when he got caught up in his work, which was often. “What’s he working on now?” he asked.

Quinn just shrugged, “Who knows. The same scary shit he’s always working on. Some new way to make dying quicker, slower, or more painful than needed.” 

“You need to get better at dragging him away from that table from time to time when Zev and I aren’t around. Maker knows what the fumes from all that junk are doing to him,” Feanor said. 

Quinn spat. “Not like I don’t try, you know how he gets though. If I even manage to pry his fingers off those bottles and tubes, he’s right back at em five minutes later. You need to take him out more. Give him something to do other than skulk around here obsessing over potions.”

Feanor just sighed and nodded. He knew Quinn was right, but really didn’t like the thought of giving Brecca anything dangerous to do. The Dwarf just wasn’t cut out for field work. Feanor called to Brecca and waved him over to the table. Brecca looked up, blinked, and smiled when he recognized Feanor. He stood up and swayed for a moment, stretched his back and blinked again, as if surprised by how stiff his muscles were. He walked around the pool in the center of the cavern and pulled a chair up to the table. He looked at Quinn as if just noticing the big man was there and smiled meekly at him. Quinn chuckled and got up from the table, returning a moment later with another mug of wine and a bottle. Brecca cupped the mug in both of his hands and smiled meekly again.

“Thanks Quinn,” he said. Quinn just nodded and patted Brecca’s shoulder. 

“Whatchya been up to these past few days, Brecca?” Feanor asked. The Dwarf’s pallid face visibly brightened.

“Oh! You’ll like it! It’s a construct of Deep Mushroom extract and the venom from a certain breed of sea snake, with a few other minor ingredients. One drop is enough to paralyze a full grown horse for hours!” Brecca took a sip and furrowed his brow, muttering into his mug, “If I can just get the damn measurements right.”

Feanor raised an eyebrow, “Well maybe you’d be able to think straighter and get it right if you slept for a couple hours.”

Brecca shot Quinn an accusing glare before looking back at Feanor with a penitent expression. “But you’ll really like this one Feanor! It’ll be so useful when it’s done!”

Feanor looked at the Dwarf with a bit of sympathy. “I know it will, Brecca. But it won’t be worth it if you drop dead from exhaustion while you’re making it. Get some sleep tonight, that’s an order.”

Brecca looked so absolutely crestfallen it actually panged Feanor a little bit. “Yes sir,” he said, then mumbled into his cup again, “I hate sleeping.” Feanor had to stifle a sigh, Brecca really did hate sleeping. He had nightmares all the time, Feanor could sympathize with nightmares.

_Brecca is the most physically unimposing individual I’ve ever met, but he’s a genius alchemist. Not just poisons - although he has a fascination with them that is frankly a bit disturbing - but poultices, stamina draughts, aphrodisiacs, you name it. We found him a couple years back just kind of wandering the streets of Denerim selling vials out of his coat pockets. I didn’t give him a second glance but Zev felt bad for the little bugger and bought a few silvers worth of his product. I won’t tell you what it was, but it worked really, really, well. Mind you Brecca was a pauper at this point, so he didn’t even have access to quality ingredients, he just made this stuff from whatever he could scrounge up. We kept going back to him and eventually offered him a spot as the Black Wardens’ resident alchemist. At first it was a bit of a charity case I’ll admit, but over time he became a genuine Brother as we learned more of his story. Brecca was born casteless in Orzamar, which is just about the shittiest circumstance a person can be born into. And I say that having grown up in an Alienage, so I know shitty when I see it. He had it better than most casteless though. He had a loving family who didn’t have to resort to crime or worse because his father was a brilliant alchemist himself, that’s where Brecca gets it. His old man’s reputation was so amazing he actually attracted the patronage of a noble, which ended up being a curse, not a blessing. The noble family who patronized Brecca’s father’s alchemy shop was in the middle of a feud with another noble house, so when these rivals found out that Brecca’s dad was “supplying” their enemies, they burned their shop and house to the ground. Killed Brecca’s father, mother, and two siblings. The only reason Brecca survived was because he was out running errands. He came back to find his home destroyed and his whole family dead in the street. And people were just…walking on by. That’s what his nightmares are about. After a few years of begging in Orzamar, Brecca made his way to the surface. How he survived as long as he did is a mystery to me. But fate brought him to us, and even though he can’t fight worth a damn, he’s an integral member of the Black Wardens. Death doesn’t always come by a blade or an arrow. Sometimes it comes from a clear, tasteless liquid mixed in with your mead. That’s how death came to the noble that ordered Brecca’s family killed._

Zevran and Alderas returned from their respective quarters and joined their other comrades. Three Elves, a Dwarf, and a Human sat chatting amiably for a while before talk turned to business. 

“So I take it you found that Crow hit squad sent for us tonight?” Quinn asked as he poured himself a fresh mug. Feanor nodded as Zevran replied:

“They did not make themselves too difficult to find, or too difficult to kill. I imagine that will change in the very near future.”

Brecca shook his head in amazement, “That’s what now, three in the past two months? Why do they have such a hard on for us? It’s not like we ever did anything to them.”

“Yeah, except kill all twelve of the guys they sent after us,” Alderas said with a maniacal chuckle. 

“That’s my point,” Brecca said, “Guys that they sent after us. They started it!”

“They started it? This isn’t Chantry school rough housing, little man,” Quinn scowled. “They know we’re better than them and they don’t like it.” 

“We should take the fight to them,” Alderas said with an overly exuberant enthusiasm, “Call all of our cells together and hit them where they live! Right in the bits!”

Zevran and Feanor exchanged glances and small grins before Zevran replied, “What did we tell you about the bits? Stop it.”

Quinn raised the eyebrow of his one good eye and made a disgusted sound, “Still shooting dead guys in the crotch you sick fuck?”

“Not anymore apparently,” Alderas said with obvious frustration.

“Good. That shit just isn’t done, kid,” Quinn said with a shake of his head.

“That’s what we told him,” Feanor said.

“Even I know that,” Brecca chuckled. 

Alderas pouted and rested his chin on his folded arms as the other four men laughed at his expense. “Honestly,” said Zevran, “It really is bizarre. I shudder to think what about it…does it for you.”

_I have a theory about that. Alderas was born a slave in Orlais. When he was maybe seven he walked in on his master’s son taking liberties with his mother. Forcibly. Imagine what that would do to a seven year old kid. Alderas jumped on this prick’s back and started beating on him. Well, young master didn’t take too kindly to that, not one bit, so he started kicking the shit out of Alderas. His mother grabbed a millet grinder and brained him, knocked him out cold. Then they made a run for it because she knew what this meant if they stuck around. They got a mile, maybe two into the woods before the hounds were sent after them. They didn’t make it much farther. Alderas’ mom got him up into a tree before the hounds got to her. He watched as they ripped her to shreds. The hunting party circled the tree Alderas was in for a couple hours lobbing arrows at him before they left. Apparently the life of a kid wasn’t worth missing dinner over. Probably figured he’d die in the woods. He stayed up there a full day before climbing down and burying what was left of his mom. Some Dalish found him lying on the shallow grave half starved to death a few days later and took him in. He lived with them for a few years, but this was one of those passive clans, and as Alderas got older it became clear that he had a thing for fighting and killing humans. Can you blame him? So when he was old enough the clan just kind of asked him to leave, and he obliged. That was a little over two years ago. The clan had trained him as a hunter, so stealth and skill with a bow came as naturally to him as breathing. And he never forgot where he came from. The nobleman’s son was by now the nobleman, and Alderas made his way back to the hold, climbed into the bed chamber, and avenged his mother. Zev and I came through the same window a few minutes later to find Chevalier fuck-face with one arrow between his eyes and one in his dangles. Alderas was hiding in a cabinet. Good work is good work, and he was obviously a kindred spirit so we asked him on. Since he said yes, we still got to collect the bounty. Gave it to Alderas. He used it to build a proper Cairn over his mom’s grave. Took a while for Alderas to warm up to Quinn. Not believing all humans are inherently evil is a relatively new development for him, and one I empathize with._

_Are you sensing a pattern here? Because there is one. Quinn, Alderas, and Brecca, they all have similar stories. Zev and I…well, our stories kind of have aspects of all three. Most of it’s a well well-known tale of which we play minor roles, so I’ll spare you the intricate details. Mostly because I don’t feel like talking about them right now. Suffice to say, I’m not a Grey Warden anymore, and Zevran isn’t an Antivan Crow. We’re Black Wardens._

_You see in reality we aren’t assassins, the Crows are assassins, we’re executioners. If you think there’s no difference you’d be in the majority, but you’d still be wrong. We execute people who believe they are above justice, and we take money for what we do so we can keep doing it. We have enough coin in our coffers for every one of us to retire and live like arls, but we don’t. Know why? Because some people need to die. If you are one of those people, I promise that sooner or later we will come for you, and we will send you to whatever Maker you wish. There are nearly a hundred of us now in a dozen cities, and every single one of us has a story like Quinn’s, Brecca’s, Zevran’s, Alderas’, and mine._

_But I’m sure none of them have a story like hers._

“Has she said anything today?” Alderas asked.

The five men at the table collectively looked to the far wall of the cavern at the copper-skinned Qunari woman sitting cross legged, staring expressionless into the pool. The scars of the removed stitches were still fresh around her lips and stood out red and raw even from a distance.

“Not a word,” Brecca said in a hushed tone tinged with awe. 

They were all in awe of the silent Qunari woman, even Feanor. How could they not be? Feanor had encountered all kinds of things in his life that were unbelievable. None came close to the Saarebas sitting across the cavern: A mage of the Qun. One that had escaped. Feanor regarded her for a moment longer before returning his attention to his mug.

“Give her time,” he said, “She will speak when she is ready.”


	3. Atonement: Zevran

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zevran's Song: 'Edge of Night' - Peter Hollens 
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnE24YdRqRU

_Still here are you? Waiting for a tale of intrigue and daring? Well, you’ll be disappointed. The majority of our time isn’t spent hunting targets or battling Crows in the shadows, those are just brief moments of panic and violence punctuating otherwise boring lives. Most days around here are actually pretty dull. We go into the city and check for messages from other cells, meet up with informants, purchase supplies, visit all the rumor mills and start a few whispers of our own, and we train for several hours a day. Makes for a lot of down time during which, and this may surprise you, we typically just act like normal people. We do things normal people do, and we have hobbies. Alderas loves to hunt and fish, Brecca has a thing for botany (a Dwarf who loves plants, go figure), and Quinn can’t get enough of chess, he also makes it a point to visit the Chantry at least once a week. Whatever. Zevran vigorously pursues the pleasures of the flesh, although not so much over the past few months as in years prior. He spends a lot of time reading history books or just sitting in quiet contemplation, if you can believe that. Me, I sing and write, play the lute and lyre…what? Don’t look at me like that. I was a Bard in my past life and music brings me solace. Seriously, stop looking at me like that. You don’t see me knocking your weird, voyeuristic interests. Creep._

_Anyway the point is that when you live in an underground cave with four other men and a frustratingly silent and disconcerting Qunari woman, you need to get out once in a while and do something normal or you’ll lose your mind. You need to recover a bit from those moments of brief violence and panic, because you can be sure that it’s only a matter of time before one of those moments is upon you again…_

Zevran laid on the soft bed propped up by several pillows with his arms behind his head staring at the ceiling. One of the woman’s arms was draped across his bare chest and her pretty face was nestled in the crook of his neck, breathing softly and rhythmically, deep in sleep. Zevran had already forgotten her name. By tomorrow he would forget what she looked like, her face would be just one in a number of conquests that swirled around in his memories like wisps without form or substance. “I’m getting too old for this,” he thought sullenly. It wasn’t exactly accurate, he was still in what many would consider the prime of his life, but Zevran Arainai felt old nonetheless, old beyond his years. And tired, so very tired. The Blight had changed him in ways that he never could have imagined as a younger man. He had grown up surrounded by death, violence, and pain, and the Crows had beaten into his mind that all of those things were just vague, abstract concepts that had no bearing on real life. His time with the heroes of Ferelden during the Blight had ripped away those attitudes with a force that had shocked him to the very core of his being. For the first time in his life he realized that his actions had deep and profound consequences not only for himself and the people around him, but potentially for the entire world. He could not change what he was: He was a killer, a living weapon. But he could change what he did, the choices he made were entirely within his own power. Zevran had never really thought about what that meant before, and it had been over quiet campfire chats with Feanor that he had come to realize it. Zevran cherished Feanor for that, more than he cherished any other person he had ever met, and he hoped that someday he would be able to find the right words to tell his friend what he meant to him. “Someday,” he thought, “Just not today.”

Like everyone who had lived through the Blight, Zevran had witnessed horrible, unspeakable things. When it was finally over he walked away with a disturbing, nagging feeling that not all of those horrible things had been caused by the Darkspawn. Some of them, a great many of them in fact, had been caused by men. Humans, Elves, Dwarves, Qunari, people that on the surface looked very much like everyone else but deep down harbored a darkness as vile as any creature summoned by an Archdemon. People that spread suffering and despair, people who crushed and took lives at their own pleasure and discretion with no thought at all of the pain it caused others. It had been with horror that it dawned on Zevran that as a Crow, he had been one of those people. He had killed without hesitation or remorse with barely a second thought for the blood he spilled. He had murdered innocents. He had murdered people who were his friends. He had even murdered people he loved. The realization of what he had been planted a dagger of grief deep in his heart, one that would be with him until his dying day. 

So he had made a choice when he reunited with Feanor soon after the Blight, they had made the decision together. They would atone for their sins the only way they knew how: By killing people who were like Zevran used to be. They would cure the disease of which the Crows were merely a symptom. Their initial hit list had been comprised almost entirely of people that Zevran knew personally and utilized the Crows on a regular basis. That was why they were at war with his former brethren now, it was not as simple as mere ‘competition,’ the Crows recognized what the Black was trying to do: They were trying to create a world in which the Antivan Crows and the Black Wardens themselves were not only unnecessary, but in which they could not even survive. Maybe that world would never exist. Maybe Zevran and Feanor and all their brothers and sisters were just hacking off heads only to see two more sprout in their places. But Zevran would keep on hacking until he couldn’t hack anymore, if for no other reason than he had chosen to do so.

Zevran gently removed the woman’s arm from his chest and got out of the bed quietly so as not to disturb her sleep. He stretched his arms over his head and made his way across the elaborately furnished room. This was one of several rooms in several of the more upscale taverns across town that were rented out perpetually to Zevran under aliases. He would spend a night or two in one of these rooms whenever the opportunity presented itself, and he rarely spent them alone. “But never with the person I would prefer to be spending them with,” he thought sadly, casting a glance at the woman still sleeping peacefully in the bed. When she woke up tomorrow Zevran would already be gone, either to another tavern under a different name or back to the Black’s cave. She would likely never see him again, and if she did, Zevran knew he would have only the vaguest recollection of her and brush her off with his characteristic detached charm. He felt a pang of guilt over that, an unusual sensation he had begun experiencing more regularly as of late. He poured himself a glass of water from a pitcher, wrapped a blanket around his waist and opened the window of the room and stared out across Denerim’s skyline. The sun had just set and the city was bathed in its residual orange glow. “Beautiful,” Zevran thought. A cool breeze blew through the open window, prickling the skin on his naked arms and torso. He closed his eyes and savored the sensation, losing himself in a moment of peace.

The arrow whizzed by his face so close that Zevran could feel its feathers brush against his cheek. He dropped into a crouch and pressed himself against the wall, grabbing a dagger stashed under the windowsill before stalking toward the door, being careful to stay under the archer’s line of sight. He grabbed a second dagger from under the table and positioned himself up against the door frame. He stayed like that for several minutes, his breathe coming in shallow spurts, listening for the sound of boots outside his door, every muscle in his body tensed, ready to lash out with his twin blades the second the door was kicked in. But it wasn’t kicked in. The hallway outside was totally silent save for the sounds of revelry drifting up from the common room below. Zevran tore his gaze away from the door toward where the arrow had planted itself in the wall, and he noticed that there was a small scroll wrapped around the shaft. Still keeping low, Zevran slid along the wall toward the arrow, wrenched it from the wood and unrolled the parchment. He read it hurriedly, then read it again, his eyebrows arched in surprise. Slowly he stood up straight, exposing himself to the open window. He closed his eyes for a moment, half expecting another arrow to bury itself in his chest, but nothing happened. Slowly Zevran walked to the open window and leaned out of it. He scanned the nearby rooftops for any sign of the archer. Seeing none, he closed and latched the window and pulled the drapes shut. In the darkness he quickly and quietly pulled on his armor and weapons with a sense of urgency. He had to get back to the cavern. Now.

The woman’s eyes fluttered open and she breathed in deep before letting out a long, contented sigh. She felt amazing, satisfied in a way she never dreamed possible. She reached out with her hand to stroke her lover’s chest, but it fell on an empty mattress. Perplexed she sat up and looked around the room, her eyes taking a moment to adjust to the darkness. Once they did, she felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She was alone.


	4. Faith: Quinn

_I’ve never been one for religion myself, at least not in the traditional sense. I’ve seen too much religion in the eyes of too many murderers. Do I believe in gods? Yes. I’ve seen them after all, or at least I’ve seen what they can become. They’re not beings I wish to worship, and if that dooms me to hell then so be it. Do I believe in the Maker? I suppose I do. Everything comes from something, so it seems impossible to me that it all came from nothing. But if there is one divine, all powerful Maker sitting up there amongst the clouds, he stopped giving a shit about us a long time ago. Look at the things men do to other men, let alone what Demons and Darkspawn do to them. How could an all-powerful Maker allow such things to happen to his children and sit by and do nothing? Either the Maker is not all good, or he is not all powerful, so what use is he? ‘So what do you believe in, Feanor?’ you ask. I believe in Fate, but I don’t pretend to understand it, and I believe in cold steel in strong hands. I believe in myself, the person standing to my right, and the person standing to my left. If there is a power higher than that, it has never helped me._

_But whether you have it or not, you have to admit that faith is a powerful thing. For some people it’s all that gets them out of bed in the morning, for others it gives them the resolve to move mountains. And even if that mountain never moves, a man of faith will never stop pushing…_

“Eyes sorrow-blinded in darkness unbroken, there upon the mountain a voice answered my call. ‘Heart that is broken beats still unceasing, an ocean of sorrow does nobody drown. You have forgotten, spear-maiden of Alamarr, within My creation none are alone.’”

Quinn knelt in the candlelit hall of Denerim’s Chantry, his one eye closed, his hands folded in supplication as he whispered the Canticle of Andraste. He knew the entire Chant of Light by heart. His parents had been extremely religious, and had raised their son to follow their example. Quinn paid lip service to the Maker and his Prophet out of respect for his parents, but he never seemed to have the conviction in his heart that they had. Once they passed away, it was not long before he drifted away from the Chantry completely. He had better things to do with his time than mumble empty words to a faceless god. But that was before his world ended, before he found himself bound between two posts watching his beloved Tessa writhe and scream under the unforgiving lashes of the whip. Quinn had cursed and raged and frothed at the mouth. He had wept and begged his master to show mercy, but that cold hearted bastard knew nothing of mercy, not even for his own daughter. Quinn’s heart ached every time he recalled the image of Tessa’s blood and tear stained face as she was dragged from the yard. He knew that he would never see her again, and at the realization his heart had broken. 

Then came the physical pain, pain the likes of which he never dared imagine a man could experience and survive. And after the pain came the darkness, deep in the mines in the bowels of the earth. The unending swing of a pickaxe in his hands, the ever present threat of the overseer’s whip slashing down at the slightest hint of faltering. Ten years. Ten years which seemed like an eternity living in a grave, a walking dead man. Quinn knew that hell was real, he had been there, and it was in hell that he had found his faith. At first it was rage that drove him to survive, then his ego and determination, and then finally just a blind animalistic instinct to keep pushing forward. Eventually they all ran out, everything he had turned to for strength abandoned him. It was in that hour of his deepest despair, curled in the darkness waiting and wishing for death that the Chant of Light returned to his lips. There in that pit for the first time in his life, Quinn meant the words that he spoke. The Chant gave him a strength he did not know he had, solace he did not know he could achieve. The pickaxe seemed suddenly to weigh nothing at all, the whips of the guards seemed like mere feathers falling on his back. And so Quinn kept saying the words, reciting the Chant over and over until the day he was finally released from the prison mines. He did not know where he would go or what he would do, so he kept saying the words, and they carried him to Ferelden. They made him stand firm against the dead at Redcliffe and the Darkspawn at Denerim. And years later, the words brought him to the Black Wardens. Quinn’s entire life was summarized and whittled down to the Chant, and to him the Black Wardens were the Chant’s purpose made flesh: They were the sword and the torch that drove back the darkness wherever they went. Most people would think him mad, and Quinn knew that some of his own brothers found his beliefs peculiar if not deranged, but none would ever dare say so to his face. Not only because they respected him, but because they knew that his faith was the one thing in the world to which he owed more loyalty than the Black Wardens. Quinn knew that Feanor himself had no use for the Maker or Andraste, but that didn’t matter. Feanor was of use to them, whether he cared or not.

He finished reciting the canticle and rose to his feet, touching his fingertips to his heart and then lightly to the feet of the statue of Andraste. Quinn lit a candle at the altar and said a few silent prayers for his brothers and sisters in the Wardens, the souls of his departed parents, and Tessa, wherever she was, and then sat alone in one of the pews in quiet contemplation. It was sundown and there were few other worshippers and Priests going about their duties and devotions. It was Quinn’s favorite time of day to visit the Chantry, when the fading light cast brilliant patterns as it gleamed through the ornate stained-glass windows. It was quiet and peaceful, the perfect time and place for reflection on the divinity of the Maker. Quinn preferred to pray alone, a luxury he was often afforded. Even the Sisters, all of whom he recognized, gave him a wide berth and barely acknowledged him. Despite his regular visits Quinn’s appearance and demeanor screamed that violence was his profession, and his imposing presence was enough to keep the other faithful at bay.

So Quinn was surprised when another man slid into the pew next to him, a normal looking man of average height and build, dressed in the garb of a common laborer and a few years younger than Quinn himself. The man seemed to be focused on reciting his own devotions, so Quinn paid him little mind after giving him a once over and returned to his own private meditations, leaving the man to his. They sat there for a few minutes in silence before the man whispered four words just loud enough for Quinn to hear: “Fire in the mountains.”

Quinn visibly stiffened, every one of his senses immediately heightened to a level of awareness that measured every detail of his surroundings as his hand instinctively went for the hilt of the short sword hidden under his cloak. The words the man had spoken were a call sign of the Black Wardens’ network of spies and informants used to signal when they had urgent information to pass along. Except Quinn knew every informant in Denerim, and he was certain he had never seen this man before. Quinn continued to stare straight ahead and mumbled out of the corner of his mouth:

“Who are you?”

“Fire in the mountains,” the man repeated.

Quinn turned his head slightly, his one eye narrowing as he measured the stranger more closely. He was still staring straight ahead, and his clothes fell about his frame naturally. If he was armed it was only with a small weapon hidden very carefully. After a moment Quinn looked away, but he kept his hand clutched tightly around the hilt of his sword.

“Ashes from the sky,” he replied, the countersign to the code words the man had spoken. 

The man gave a barely perceptible nod and a folded piece of parchment appeared as if by magic in his hand. He subtly slid it to Quinn who took it in his own hand. He glanced down at it, wishing for a moment he still had another eye to keep on the strange messenger. Quinn’s jaw tightened when he saw the seal on the folded piece of paper: Stylized black feathers forming two white eyes on a field of red. The symbol of the Antivan Crows. Quinn pulled his sword a few inches out of his scabbard as he glared at the stranger.

“Who are you?” Quinn asked again, this time with considerably more steel in his voice than before. The man continued staring straight ahead but smiled slightly as he replied in a whisper:

“It seems Beloved Andraste has delivered a gift to you and your Warden friends. The Antivan Crows say this: There will be no more killing…for the time being.”

“Your ilk doesn’t get to decide when the killing stops,” Quinn scowled. The only thing keeping his sword in its sheath was their location. The stranger seemed to be aware of that fact, as his eyes drifted momentarily to where Quinn was gripping his sword under his cloak, and then finally up to Quinn’s face. The bastard actually smiled at him, as if daring him to draw his blade.

“The killing has not stopped, it has only paused. Nobody crosses the Crows and lives, the time will come for you and yours. But for now it is in our best interest to cease hostilities. You will find it is in your best interest as well.”

“I somehow doubt that very much,” Quinn replied. The man just shrugged.

“Take that letter back to your brothers. Read it. Discuss it. I think you will find that in this at least, our interests very much align.”

The man who Quinn now knew to be a Crow casually slid out from the pew, bowed slightly toward the altar, and paused as he turned to depart and whispered to Quinn in a tone that was no longer cocky and conversational, but cold and threatening:

“Be patient my friend. The business between us will be settled soon enough.”

With that the Crow departed, leaving Quinn once again alone in the pew. He sat there for several minutes until his heart stopped hammering in his chest. He looked down at the piece of paper which was now crumpled in his clenched fist, the seal was still intact. Quinn considered opening it and reading it right there, but he thought better of it and slid the paper inside his cloak. It would be better for Feanor to read it first. And besides, whatever the message contained, Quinn was certain it would evoke emotions from him he would prefer not to feel inside a house of worship.


	5. Plots and Prophesies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Black Wardens find themselves in the middle of a strange plot, and the Saarebas makes an unsettling prophecy.

_Remember when I talked about those brief moments of panic and violence that punctuate normally boring lives? Those moments are usually preceded by signs, omens, or harbingers, usually of a dark and sinister nature. If you’re sharp enough you can spot them and brace yourself for the shit storm that inevitably follows. Note the “If,” I cannot emphasize the “if” enough here, IF you’re sharp enough. Because these signs and portents you need to be on the look-out for are usually subtle little things that you only notice in retrospect. But once in a while you luck out and fate tosses you a ‘heads up’ so grotesquely obvious that you would have to be some sort of raging moron to miss it. On these occasions, a slight alteration of one’s course is usually enough to avert impending disaster._

_Or you could…you know…pull out your daggers and dive into the abyss screaming like a madman. Which you would have to be, because what kind of sane person would dive into an abyss, figurative or otherwise?_

_That’s not rhetorical. I’m a habitual abyss-diver and I really could use some validation right now because honestly, and this is between you and me, I think I may have a problem._

Feanor stood with his hands spread wide on the table staring intently at the two messages laid side by side in front of him, as if glaring at them would help dispel the multitude of doubts and worries they raised. The messages themselves were cryptic enough, and the manner in which they had been delivered was vastly unsettling. Zevran and Quinn had returned within minutes of each other. As they recounted their stories Feanor felt icy tendrils of fear creep into his stomach, it was not a sensation he was used to feeling. That archer could have put his arrow through Zevran’s chest, and that messenger could have just as easily laid a trap for Quinn. They knew exactly whom to deliver these messages to, and knew exactly where and when to find them. The Crows had been able to crack the Wardens’ networks in other cities, but never Denerim’s. This was Black Warden headquarters, the seat of their entire kingdom-spanning network, and they had gone through infinite pains to ensure their network here was watertight. Their security had proven itself to be iron clad, and not a single Crow had been able to enter the city limits without them knowing. Until tonight. They knew right where to find Zev and Quinn, and one of the messengers had used carefully guarded Warden code words. If they knew that, what else did they know? The implications were staggering.

Feanor let out an exasperated sigh and began pacing with his arms folded across his chest. Zevran, Quinn, Brecca, and Alderas were all gathered around the table, all with expressions of worry on their faces. Each of them shared the fears of the others, and not a few uneasy glances drifted toward the cave’s entrance, as if they were all expecting a gaggle of armed Crows to come bursting in at any second. Feanor forced himself to stop pacing and looked at the messages again. They both said basically the same thing, their wording almost identical. They announced that the Crows had recently secured a very lucrative contract, and that one of the conditions of this contract was that they cease all hostilities against the Wardens…because the client was extending the contract to them as well. Whoever it was, this client apparently wanted their target eliminated badly enough to employ Thedas’ two most well-known assassin guilds despite the fact that they were engaged in open warfare with each other. The client also didn’t want the two rival factions expending resources against each other while the contract was still open, hence the enforced truce, the terms of which the Crows had apparently already agreed to. Buried within the letters was a code identifying time and place for the Wardens to meet with the client and discuss details of the contract. If they refused the contract, the temporary truce was null and void. The implied threat was that this mysterious client had access to information about the Wardens that would be passed on to the Crows in the event the Black refused the contract. Feanor would not have been at all surprised if the same threat had been levelled at the Crows as well. 

The silence in the cavern was stifling. Feanor had no idea how to break it, and so he was grateful when Zevran did.

“So…trap?” Zevran asked rhetorically.  
“Trap,” agreed Quinn.

“Obviously a trap,” said Alderas.

“I…uhm…I’m not sure it’s a trap,” Brecca said sheepishly.

Three pairs of eyes looked at Brecca like he was a naïve idiot, but Feanor’s interest was piqued. Brecca may not have been an ideal knife-man, but mentally the Dwarf was sharp as a razor. Feanor shot the other three men a look to silence them before they said anything, and nodded at Brecca to continue his thought process.

“Well, why go through this elaborate bullshit? Obviously they already know how to get to us, so what would be the point in sending us these messages if it were all just a ruse to…what? Get all of us to go to this meeting where they can set the building on fire and kill us all in one fell swoop? They’re not stupid and they know we’re not stupid, no way they expect more than one or two of us to go to this thing, and they could have killed one or two of us tonight.”

Brecca gave Zev and Quinn an apologetic look, “No offense,” he said.

“None taken,” Zevran said with a chuckle. Quinn just scowled and spat.

“Look,” Brecca continued, seemingly more confident now that he hadn’t been shouted down, “Obviously whatever is going on here is shady as shit, and we should be worried. But if the Crows really had the drop on us they wouldn’t have bothered to go through all of this wishy-washy conspiracy nonsense. They’d take us out quick, clean, and simple. All of these bells and whistles…what’s the point?”

The other four men regarded each other for a moment as they chewed over Brecca’s words. Feanor nodded slowly and stroked his chin.

“I think you may be right Brecca,” he said. “If the Crows had an advantage, real or imagined, they wouldn’t squander it by complicating the situation.”

“I agree,” Zevran said. “They would not have risked warning us, which is exactly what these messages have done. For all they know we get these letters, sense a trap, pack up and leave. Then they’re back to square one, and I think by now they’ve tasted enough of our steel to know that square one is not a place they want to be with us.”

“So wait, wait, wait,” Alderas chimed in, “If this isn’t some elaborate Crow plot then that means that all the crazy shit in these letters is true. There’s some mysterious client out there that wants to kill someone badly enough to hire us and our mortal enemies at the same time, and thinks that they carry enough weight to keep us from killing each other in the process.”

“Well apparently they do have the weight,” Quinn said, “The Crows already agreed to it. They wouldn’t stop this fight for just anyone, I don’t care how big the payout is. There’s gotta be something else going on here.”

“Indeed,” said Zevran, “The Crows have coin flowing in from all over Thedas. I cannot imagine a single bounty being high enough for them to suspend the vendetta they have sworn against us.”

“And we could say the same,” Feanor added grimly, “But apparently whoever is orchestrating this little masquerade has something more than money to offer…or more likely…something to threaten with.”

It was silent for a moment as that thought sunk in before Alderas let out a low whistle.

“Say what you will about them, but the Crows don’t scare for anything,” he said.

“They scared for this,” Feanor said, touching the two letters. “And whoever scared them is expecting the same from us.”

“Well fuck em!” Alderas said with his usual misguided exuberance. “We’re the Black gods-damned Wardens! We’re not gonna bow to this shit…are we?”

Quinn grunted in half-hearted agreement and Brecca chuckled nervously, Feanor and Zevran exchanged knowing glances.

“This is uncharted territory,” Feanor sighed, “We’re completely blind. We have no idea who this client is, what the contract is, what this guy has over the Crows, or what he might have over us.” Feanor paused, gritted his teeth, and made a decision: “We go to this meeting. We see who’s trying to jack us around and who knows? Maybe it will be worthwhile to play their game.”

The four men nodded in agreement.

“So, what’s the plan?” Quinn asked.

Feanor thought for a moment and grinned mischievously. “We’re going to do that really stupid thing Brecca mentioned and all go to this soiree together.”

“Wait,” Brecca said, his eyes going wide, “All of us?”

“Yes Brecca, all of us,” Feanor replied. “You been training with that crossbow? You can hit a target?”

“Well yeah but…”the Dwarf stammered. 

“Then start coating bolts with something that can kill really quickly and strap in. And we’re gonna need to go through your bag of tricks and gadgets. I have an idea…whoever these bastards are, if they try to pull a fast one on us they’re gonna get a big hurt. Now this meeting is in two nights at a roadside inn between here and Amaranthine, we’ll have to leave tomorrow if we want to get there on time and scout the surrounding…”

“You should not go.”

The low, raspy, female voice was so utterly unexpected that all of the men at the table flinched. Brecca jumped right out of his seat, Zevran took an involuntary step back, Feanor stood bolt upright, and Quinn and Alderas stared wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the Saarebas standing a few feet away from them.

“Holy shit she’s talking,” Alderas said in shock. 

“Shut the fuck up!” Quinn said slapping his arm and sounding almost on the verge of panic. 

Quinn, Alderas, and Brecca stepped out of the way as the Saarebas slowly made her way up to the table. Feanor kept his cold emerald eyes locked on the Qunari’s deep purple ones, adopting a hardened expression in response to the woman’s stoic expressionless one. Neither of them blinked, but slowly the Saarebas looked away from Feanor down to the letters on the table, then back to him.

“You should not go,” she repeated.

Feanor glanced at Zevran out of the corner of his eye, but his friend just shrugged, visibly at a loss for words. Feanor returned his hard gaze to the Saarebas. These were the first words she had spoken in the three weeks she had been with them, the first time she had left her spot by the pool to interact at all beyond receiving her meals. Now she was offering advice on a topic she knew nothing about. Normally Feanor would have found that very vexing and presumptuous, but there was something in her voice, a calm certainty that made his nerves stand on end. Deep down, he knew she was right.

“Why?” he asked, “What do you know of this?”

The Qunari Mage slowly extended her hand and touched each of the letters with the tips of her fingers. She closed her eyes and an expression of concentration and what might have been pain crossed her features. When she opened her eyes her expression was neutral once again and her eyes refocused on Feanor’s.

“They will ask you to do something you cannot do, and when you refuse your enemies will multiply. These men you will face are unlike anything you have faced before.”

“You have no idea what I can do, and even less of what I’ve faced,” Feanor said, his voice becoming colder, a hint of menace glinting in his eyes. Images of the monstrosities he had faced during the Blight flashed in his mind’s eye. Memories of the things he had done…

“You have faced Demons and Darkspawn, horrors in the deepest, darkest places of Thedas. And you have killed without hesitation or remorse even those who were unwilling victims of the monsters you had sworn to protect the world from.”

Feanor felt suddenly like he had been punched in the chest. New images flashed through his mind unbidden. Those villagers, the Mages, Connor…that poor boy…

“You have ice in your veins Feanor of Denerim, but you are chained to your remorse. That is why you cannot do what these men will ask of you. And when you refuse them, the power they will bring to bear on you and your brethren will destroy you all.”

Feanor could feel the woman’s words stirring inside him like a living creature, sinking into the very core of his being. Something inside him snapped. His teeth flashed in a feral snarl as both his fists slammed onto the table. He would have lunged forward if not for the strong hands of Zevran and Quinn that shot out to grab and restrain him. Alderas and Brecca stepped back from the table, their eyes wide with shock. Quinn gripped Feanor under his arm and shoulder, staring across at Zevran who had the other arm. Zevran could only shake his head. Feanor had rage buried within him, he kept it at bay by being cold and hardened. Of the four other men present, only Zevran had ever witnessed Feanor truly lose control of himself, and not for many years. Feanor felt deeply, but he had always been a master of those feelings. For whatever reason, this Qunari woman’s words had broken his self-control. Zevran expected it was magic at work, he could practically feel the power radiating from this strange Qunari, unlike anything he had ever felt. Not for the first time, Zevran wondered whether they should have slit her throat and dumped her in the river when they had the chance, for now she seemed to be prophesying doom on them all.

Feanor’s outburst lasted only a few seconds before he regained control of himself. He took a few deep breathes and unclenched his hands, backing away from the table a bit to show Quinn and Zevran he was alright. They relaxed their grips but did not release him completely. Feanor looked back across the table at the Saarebas. She had not flinched, she remained perfectly still and expressionless as if she was carved from stone. Feanor took another deep breathe, steeling himself before meeting the Qunari’s gaze.

“How do you know these things?” he asked, his voice raspy and quivering from residual anger. “Who are you? Who are these people?”

The Qunari cocked her head slightly to the side, “Saarebas,” she said sadly, “We are all Saarebas.” 

The emotion in her voice was barely audible, but was so intense it completely disarmed Feanor. His limbs went totally slack. Her words seemed to have the same effect on the other four men. Zevran and Quinn released their holds on Feanor completely. Quinn audibly choked and Zevran put a hand to his chest and looked as if he had been struck. Alderas let out a long sigh that seemed on the verge of breaking into a sob, and Brecca just stared dumbly at the floor and wrapped his arms around himself.

“These people,” Feanor said again, his voice suddenly calm and compassionate, “Who are they?” he asked.

Again the Saarebas slowly reached across the table and lightly touched one of the letters.

“The Red Hand,” she said simply. Then she turned and without another word walked away. The four men stared after her in silence. As she retreated, each of them blinked and looked at each other, as if none of them was sure what had just transpired and needed a moment to regain their wits. Feanor felt like a fog was receding from his brain. He shook his head and rubbed his eyes with his palms. He looked down at the letter the Saarebas had touched, and his eyes fixed on the seal. It was not the seal of the Antivan Crows that was on the other message, it was a symbol none of them had ever seen before.

A red hand inside a black circle.


	6. The Red Hand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Feanor and Zevran meet the mysterious Red Hand.

_So…yeah. Everyone has their faults. Character flaws, quirks, ticks, eccentricities, bad habits, whatever you want to call them. One of mine is that I can’t stand to leave things unfinished, it sticks in my craw. It’s a fairly common trait among the people who ply my trade. Someone tells you ‘no, don’t, you can’t’ and every instinct in your body makes you want to defy it. When you set your sights on something, or something just happens to drift into your sights, you need to be a tenacious, hard-hitting bastard. If you’re not, you’ll never get anything done._

_Of course this is also the main reason you’ll never meet an old assassin. Sooner or later, you’re going to go after something that’s too big to handle. And it will beat you._

“What if they search you for weapons?” Brecca asked nervously, fidgeting with the string of his crossbow.

Feanor just chuckled as he and Zev gingerly pulled on the matching knee-length coats over their armor and assorted weaponry. 

“Brecca,” Zevran responded cheerfully, “We’re highly trained assassins walking into a meeting where someone we’ve never met is going to offer us a ridiculous amount of money to kill someone else we've never met. Of course they know we’re armed, and it would be insulting for them to check us.”

“You know I’m not talking about the knives and swords,” said Brecca.

“Daggers,” Feanor corrected him as he clasped up his overcoat.

“Whatever,” Brecca said rolling his eyes, “You know what I mean.”

Feanor did know, and he winced slightly as the six delicate clay bulbs sewn into the inside of his coat clinked against his armor. If one of them broke it would make for a very…awkward and likely life-ending situation. Feanor forced himself not to think about that possibility and kept his expression calm and confident.

“Don’t worry about that,” he said, “Just worry about keeping that crossbow pointed at the front door. Anyone but us comes out, shoot em.”

“Anyone but us,” Zevran repeated, emphasizing the ‘but us.’ “I swear Brecca, if you accidentally shoot me my spirit will come back from the Fade and haunt you until your dying day.”

Feanor smiled as Brecca muttered something about knowing what he was doing and settled in behind a fallen tree, resting his crossbow on the trunk and leveling it at the door of the inn. It was an unremarkable single story building maybe a dozen yards from where the Wardens were positioned across the road in a small copse of trees. There were hundreds of such roadside inns all over Ferelden. They were rarely crowded, but this one seemed conspicuously devoid of life. There were no wagons or tethered horses out front and the building itself was in a sorry state of repair. It would have seemed abandoned if not for the glow of light that leaked out from the shuttered windows. Someone was definitely inside, the same someone who had summoned the Wardens here ostensibly to offer them employment.

Alderas materialized from the shadows like a wraith. Dressed in all black to blend in with the night, only his eyes were visible between the hood and cowl that covered his face.  
“Perimeter’s all clear,” Alderas said, “If this weirdo has sword arms, they're all inside."

“Alright,” Feanor nodded, “Everyone stay sharp and frosty. Brecca, keep your eye on that front door, Alderas keep patrolling the perimeter. Quinn, keep the horses quiet and if you hear things start getting ugly, come running as fast as you can with that Druffalo-killer.”

Quinn grinned and clutched the hilt of the massive great-sword sheathed on his back. Alderas and Brecca both nodded before Alderas vanished between the trees as silently as he had appeared. Feanor and Zevran stepped casually from cover and headed toward the door.

“So,” Zev asked, “Are we going to play good rogue, bad rogue?”

Feanor grinned. Both he and Zev had very intense personalities that were expressed in very different ways, and they used them to throw people off their game. Zevran oozed charm and was practically impossible to dislike, Feanor on the other hand radiated menace. His cold, blank stare made people immensely uncomfortable. Feanor could disarm just about anyone with a glare as easily as Zevran could disarm anyone with a smile. Engaging with both of them at the same time was usually enough to throw anyone from street toughs to nobility off balance. Their tandem game had proven to be extremely valuable over the years, especially when faced with the kind of shady clientele they dealt with on a regular basis.

“I imagine it will play out that way,” Feanor responded as he grasped the latch and opened the door. The two Elves stepped inside and froze in the doorway.

“…or maybe not,” Feanor whispered grimly as he scanned the room.

It was filled with twelve heavily armed and armored men who made no effort to conceal what they were. A single glance told Feanor all he needed to know about them: These were no mere mercenaries or hired muscle, these men were all cold blooded killers. Just the way they were standing advertised professional training and expertise in the use of the tools of their trade. And there was something about their intensely focused glares that made Feanor uneasy. He could not quite put his thumb on it, until he noticed one of their eyes. The natural hazel color of the man’s irises were tinged with an angry red haze and seemed to faintly glow in the dimly-lit room. Feanor glanced at the eyes of the other men and saw the same phenomenon. Whatever the cause of the red eyes, it was not natural.

“Ah, the Black Wardens,” a heavily accented voice called from the center of the room, “I am so glad you decided to attend. Please, step in out of the cold night air and have a seat.”

Feanor slowly closed the door behind him, and he and Zev measured the owner of the voice as they walked cautiously across the room. He was dark skinned and middle aged with dark, slicked back hair that had tinges of grey around the temples and a trimmed, oiled beard. He was the only man in the room sitting at one of the tables, he was also the only one that was unarmored and appeared to be unarmed, and there was no red glow emanating from his dark eyes. He wore robes of black and red that seemed similar to those worn by circle Mages but were vaguely different in a manner that Feanor could not quite place. Perhaps it was their lavish style, obviously more expensive and better made than the robes worn by Mages of any rank below Grand Enchanter. 

Feanor slowly sat in one of the chairs across the table, Zevran remained standing just over his shoulder. The man looked at both of them in turn, smiling amicably. 

“I am honored that the commanders of the Black chose to meet with me personally,” he nodded at Zevran, “Zevran Arainai,” the man said by way of greeting. If Zevran was surprised that he knew his identity, he did not show it. He kept his expression neutral and nodded politely. The man returned the gesture and turned to Feanor. “And Feanor…?”

“Just Feanor,” Feanor replied coldly, keeping his face carefully expressionless. “It’s a mononym, like ‘Andraste.’”

The man’s smile widened, flashing a row of perfect, pearly-white teeth. “Very well,” he said, “Welcome Zevran and ‘just’ Feanor. I have heard much of your prowess and it is a pleasure to meet you finally.”

“Since you know our names,” Feanor said cautiously, “Might we know yours?”

The man spread his hands as if expecting applause, “I am the Red Hand,” he said.

 _Of course you are,_ thought Feanor.

“Your name is 'the Red Hand?'” Zevran inquired curiously.

“You know,” said Feanor, “Distant relation to the Blue Foot.”

The Red Hand actually laughed heartily at that and slapped his knee.

“Oh my,” he said, “How delightfully droll.”

“Thank the Maker you think so,” Zevran said shooting a cautious glare at Feanor. “Might I say Ser…Hand…you travel with an impressive retinue.”

“Ah yes, my guards,” the Hand said, gesturing to the crowd of gathered warriors spread around the room. “You must excuse their presence. One cannot be too careful, these are dark times we live in.”

“You remember a time in Thedas’ history that was not dark?” Feanor asked. The Hand chuckled again and wagged his finger.

“True enough,” he said. “You must admit however, that these times are especially vexing. A hole in the sky, demons falling across the veil, the Chantry all but destroyed, a war between Mages and Templars, and a rogue Inquisition that answers to nothing but itself.” The Hand shook his head sadly, “One could be excused for believing the world is coming to an end.”

Feanor nodded slowly, “But not you. If you thought the world was coming to an end, you would have no need of us."

The Hand smiled knowingly and his eyes glinted mischief, “Correct you are my astute friend,” he said.

He folded his hands on the table and adopted a more businesslike tone. Feanor watched him carefully, his eyes occasionally darting to the armed men standing about the room. None of them seemed to have so much as shifted their weight from one foot to the other.

“I am told that the Black Wardens are the best,” the Hand began, “And the contract I am opening requires the best to carry it out.”

“If you have heard we are the best,” Zevran said cautiously, “Why have you hired the Antivan Crows as well?”

“Because I have also been told that they are the best,” he said matter-of-factly. “That is why you are fighting, is it not? The Antivan Crows have been around for a hundred years, the Black Wardens for less than ten. It is a tale as old as time itself, told in every culture. The old and powerful king rises to meet the challenge of a young and vigorous upstart. Yet the tales never seem to agree on the outcome. So I decided to hedge my bets, if one wants a job done badly enough one cannot afford to rely solely on a single party, however great they are rumored to be.”

Feanor glanced over his shoulder at Zevran who met his gaze and nodded slightly. At least the Hand’s logic made sense. It was a little bit comforting to know that they weren’t dealing with an eccentric loon who thought of this as a game. Feanor returned his gaze to the Hand and chose his words carefully.

“The issues between the Crows and the Black run a little deeper than that. I’m sure that they would agree, so I’m curious to know what you offered them that made them agree to the unique terms of your contract,” Feanor paused, “And what you seem to think is enough to make us agree.”

“For payment, I offer whatever you want,” the Hand said. There was a long pause.

“Whatever we want?” Zevran asked in a very skeptical tone. The Hand replied with a smile that was full of insinuations.

“Whatever you want,” he repeated. “Money, influence, information, they are of no consequence. And something far more valuable,” he paused. “Reputation. Whoever successfully closes this contract will be able to claim, beyond any doubt, that they are indeed superior. If it is you, your reputation will soar, you will be untouchable. You will watch as your power waxes and that of the Crows wanes. If you succeed in this where they fail, their days will be well and truly numbered. Reputation my friends, is more powerful than steel or magic. Either the Crows will wither and die, or you will.”

The Hand’s words rolled over in Feanor’s mind. What he was suggesting, that this kill would signify the ascension or destruction of either the Black Wardens or the Antivan Crows, seemed unimaginable. It had to be grandstanding. Feanor grinned coldly and shook his head as he leaned forward across the table.

“Impossible. The Crows will not go away if they fail in just this one task, nor will we.”

“And even if it were possible,” Zevran added, “If you are so powerful that you can offer us anything we want, and I promise that we can imagine quite a bit, why don’t you just kill this person yourself?”

The Hand leaned back in his chair, resting his hands on his lap. He looked first to Zevran, “There is a time and a place for all things under the sun,” he said cryptically, “And at this time my place is in the shadows. And as for the impossible,” his gaze settled once again on Feanor, “Nothing is impossible.” There was an icy certainty in the Hand’s voice that brooked no contradiction. Feanor stared at him for a moment before deciding he believed him. This was a man used to power, and Feanor did not doubt he could deliver on his grand promises. Feanor nodded and matched the Hand’s posture of ease and confidence. 

“Ok,” he said, “We’ll bite. Who is the target?”

The Red Hand produced a small piece of paper from the folds of his robe, placed it face down on the table and slid it to Feanor. He stared at it for a moment before carefully picking it up and turning it over. His heart skipped a beat in his chest. He blinked a few times, not believing what he was reading. The words of the Saarebas echoed in his mind: _They will ask you to do something you cannot do…_ and everything she had said after that. He held the paper up over his shoulder so Zevran could see, and his friend gasped in surprise. Feanor looked at him, and a silent communication passed between the two men. Feanor carefully folded the paper, placed it on the table, and slid it back to the Hand. He folded his arms and glared, the Hand didn’t flinch.

“No,” Feanor said.

The Hand did more than flinch at that. His brow furrowed and his eyes narrowed, the muscles of his jaw twitched as he clenched his teeth.

“No?” The Hand asked, as if he did not quite understand what the word meant.

“No,” Feanor repeated. “The Black Wardens do not accept this contract. We will leave it to the Crows to benefit from your…largesse.”

The Hand’s nostrils flared. He cracked his knuckles and slowly placed his palms flat on the table. Feanor was sure he saw one of the man’s eyes twitch.

“Why?” the Hand demanded, just barely keeping his voice level.

“Perhaps you were not made clear on the nature of our work,” Zevran said. His face was cold, none of the usual charm registered in his voice. “We only kill people who deserve death.”

“And you think that she does not deserve death?” the Hand asked, his voice rising slightly in pitch.

“No,” Feanor said without hesitation. “Not for you, not for anyone. Not for all the coin in Thedas.”

The Hand stared at them both through eyes that had narrowed into slits. Finally he slumped back in his chair and sighed.

“That is…unfortunate,” he said, almost sadly. “I must admit, I expected men in your line of work to be completely lacking in moral qualms. Your dedication to whatever oaths you have sworn is commendable, lesser men would have abandoned them for much less then what I offer you. I believed that everyone has a price, it seems I was mistaken. You have my respect, Black Wardens.”

“So there are no…hard feelings?” Zevran asked cautiously.

“None whatsoever,” the Hand said with the utmost sincerity. Feanor relaxed a bit and felt Zevran do the same at his back.

“Do not misunderstand,” the Hand continued, “I cannot possibly let you live.”

“What!?” exclaimed Feanor. The Hand just shrugged.

“You have seen my face, you know who it is I want killed, and I’m afraid I cannot allow the possibility, however slight, of you interfering with what must be done,” the Hand sounded remorseful, as if he had no other choice, “I am truly sorry. You would have made powerful allies.” 

“We will not interfere!” Zevran pleaded, “That is not how this works! Let us walk out that door and you need never hear from us again, I swear it!”

“And I believe you, Zevran Arainai, truly I do,” the Hand said affectionately. Then his voice turned cold, “But in this, I’m afraid you are either with me or against me.”

The Hand waved and as one twelve swords were unsheathed and the guards began advancing purposefully toward the table. Feanor sprang to his feet and pressed his back against Zevran’s, both men dropping into defensive stances. They looked about the room frantically, and Feanor knew there was no way they’d make it past so many well trained swords.

“Wait, wait!” Feanor said, his hands extended in supplication, “Just…listen to me for one moment!”

The Hand raised a finger and his men stopped advancing but did not lower their swords, Feanor looked desperately into the man’s eyes.

“Just answer me this,” Feanor said, “Do you know what lyrium sand is?”

The Hand’s eyes narrowed, more out of curiosity than suspicion, “Yes…”

“Oh, good,” Zevran said, and with a smile and a flourish he opened his long coat, revealing six clay bulbs each about the size of a fist sewn into pockets on the sides. The guardsmen looked at each other and their master with what might have been confusion, not sure of how they should react. The Hand himself seemed quizzical as well, but he visibly straightened in his chair.

“Not a very spectacular thing, lyrium sand,” Feanor said as he slowly unclasped his own coat to reveal another six bulbs, “Rare, but actually pretty useless…unless you want to knock down a wall.” Feanor plucked one of the balls from his coat and held it up between his thumb and forefinger. “Because when mixed with the right components, a handful can blow a hole through six feet of granite. If you really want a big bang, you can just drop in a few grains of drakestone.” Feanor rolled the clay bulb across the table toward the Hand, who caught it and held it up gingerly.

“There are two compartments inside that little ball,” Feanor said with a malicious grin, “One containing lyrium sand and the other containing shavings of drakestone. Note how thin the clay is. Drop one, fall on one, bump one the wrong way, and boom. One goes off, so do the other eleven in this room. They all break and there’ll be nothing left of this inn but a smoking crater.” Feanor chuckled without mirth, his cold grin turning into an even colder sneer. “See where I’m going with this, ruffles?”

The Hand held up the ball Feanor had rolled to him, understanding and a hint of fear dawned in his eyes. He looked from the ball to Feanor, whose face was now blank as a slate.

“You’re bluffing,” the Hand hissed, “You would kill yourselves!”

“And we would die smiling,” Zevran said with a grin, “Knowing that they will be finding pieces of you and your lackeys in Val Royeaux.”

“So why don’t you just calm the fuck down and reconsider the whole letting us walk out of here bit?” Feanor asked.

The Hand’s face contorted with contained rage, his mouth forming words that did not seem to come. Suddenly he calmed, sat back in his chair and gently laid the clay ball down on the table in front of him. He waved a hand.

“Go,” he said simply.

The armed men sheathed their swords and carefully stepped back to the walls.

“Good choice, well done,” Zevran said.

Feanor and Zev stepped lightly to the door, keeping their backs pressed together and their coats held open as they moved. Just as they reached it the Hand spoke again and the duo paused.

“You are already dead,” he said in a monotone voice. Feanor glanced over to him, he sat calmly at the table, his face unreadable. “You are now marked, this only delays the inevitable.”

“Yeah well, all men must die. Guess we’ll just have to delay it as long as we can, won’t we?” Feanor opened the door, “Probably shouldn’t follow us. I might get twitchy and start lobbing these little guys over my shoulder.” Feanor jingled his coat and winked at the Hand before he and Zev stepped out into the night.

As soon as the door closed, Feanor put his fingers to his lips and whistled shrilly. The two Elves sprinted across the road into the grove of trees. When they got there, Quinn was already in his saddle.

“Take it that didn’t go well?” he asked as Feanor and Zevran sprang onto their horses. Alderas materialized from the darkness and climbed onto his mount, pulling Brecca up behind him.

“Nope,” Feanor said, “And I’m pretty sure we just pissed off a Mage, so let’s get scarce before he realizes these things are just filled with pebbles and dirt.”

The four horses kicked into a gallop. They rode hard and fast for a long time, putting as much distance between themselves and the inn as possible before they had to slow their horses to a canter. Quinn rode up next to Feanor.

“So, what did they want?” he asked.

Feanor looked at Quinn, just barely making out the features of his face in the dark.

“They wanted us to kill the Inquisitor.”


	7. Nightmares and Sorrow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Black Wardens are ambushed and suffer a tragic loss.

_…Sometimes there’s just nothing to say..._  
The Black Wardens did not break for Denerim, instead they veered to the northwest toward Amaranthine and planned to loop back around. They kept to lesser known game trails of the forest rather than traverse the main roads. They travelled fast and stealthily, resting only for a few hours at a time. It was only after three days of almost constant movement that, satisfied they were not being tracked, they paused to set up a proper camp for the night. It was five exhausted Wardens who collapsed into their bedrolls that night, each of them drifting into sleep almost immediately. 

Now Feanor was dreaming. Horrible dreams filled with a cacophony of thousands of voices screaming. In his sleeping mind’s eye he saw them: A vast horde stretched as far as the eye could see, raging and gnashing their teeth in the throes of insatiable hunger. As one the horde lurched forward screaming, screaming, screaming… 

_They are coming._

Feanor sat bolt upright with a gasp, eyes frantically scanning the mouth of the ravine where they had made camp the night before. It was just after dawn, Quinn was still snoring loudly next to him, Brecca was sitting up rubbing the sleep out of his eyes and Zevran was casually throwing sticks onto still red embers in an attempt to restart their fire. Feanor kicked out of his bedroll, slapping Quinn on the shoulder as he stood. The big man woke instantly and sat up clutching a dagger, he looked around and seeing nothing abnormal looked after Feanor with a curious and somewhat irritated expression.

“What the hell is going on?” Quinn demanded. Zevran and Brecca both stood and looked at Feanor in confusion as he hurriedly strapped on his brace of daggers.

“We have to go,” Feanor said, barely keeping his voice level in spite of the panic rising in his chest. “Right now. Take only what you need, we’re going to ride hard.”

Quinn stood up now clearly alarmed and grabbed the great sword sheathed by his bedroll. Zevran walked to Feanor and took his friend by the shoulders.

“Feanor,” Zev said, “What is going on? You’re acting like a lunatic, there’s no one…”

Feanor grabbed Zevran by the wrist and looked him square in the eye with a look Zevran had not seen since… “Darkspawn,” Feanor hissed.

Zevran pulled back his hand as if he had touched something hot. He stared at Feanor with wide, disbelieving eyes. Then his face hardened, Feanor still carried the Grey Warden taint, and the blood never lied.

“Maker preserve us,” muttered Quinn, clutching his sword close to his chest. Brecca just stared straight ahead in shock.

“Where are they?” Zevran asked.

Feanor paused and cocked his head slightly, like a hound trying to catch a scent.

“Close,” he replied. “Very close, and getting closer. If we don’t get out now they’ll be on us in…”

Feanor stopped mid-sentence and looked again around the camp, a lump forming in his throat.

“Where’s Alderas?” he asked.

Zevran’s eyes went wide. In his shock he had forgotten the other Elf had already left. 

“He went hunting,” Zevran said, his voice heavy with fear, “He left just before sunrise.”

Feanor cursed and punched the air in frustration. He paced for a moment before crouching down, immediately picking out the footprints leading out of the camp and down into the ravine. Feanor stood up and began following them.

“I’m going after him,” Feanor said. “If we’re not back in ten minutes ride out of here like hell is on your heels.”

“I’m coming with you,” Zevran called and strapped on his longsword as he hurried after Feanor. Feanor whirled on him and planted a finger in Zev’s chest.

“That was an order Zev, if I don’t come back…”

“You know that’s not how it works with me,” Zevran interrupted as he pushed past him.

Feanor stared after Zev incredulously as the other Elf took the lead jogging into the ravine. _He’s right,_ Feanor thought, _That’s not how it works with him._ Feanor shook his head and turned back to Quinn and Brecca, who both looked as though they were about to follow as well.

“No!” Feanor said with steel in his voice, halting the other two men in their tracks. “Someone needs to make it back to Denerim, tell the network about what happened. Send warning to the other cells. The Black must survive, that’s the most important thing here. Ten minutes!” Feanor sprinted after Zev, leaving Quinn and Brecca alone in the camp. The two men looked at each other, and Quinn started to pray.

Alderas exhaled slowly as he drew his bowstring back to his ear, grinning as his sights settled on the small doe grazing a few yards ahead of him. _We’ll eat good today,_ he thought with a smile. Suddenly somewhere off to the left above the crest of the ravine wall, a twig snapped and the doe immediately bolted into the foliage. Alderas stood completely still, keeping his bow drawn tight. The woods around him had gone eerily silent, and his hunter’s senses were all on edge. Something was very wrong. Slowly he turned to the left, twisting at his midsection, keeping his feet planted and his bow taut. His eyes followed the sloping rise of the ravine up to its crest. 

The Genlock leaped into the ravine practically right on top of Alderas. Acting on pure instinct, he arced his bow up and let the arrow fly. Head, shaft, and fletching all tore through the creature’s neck and exited at the base of its skull. The lifeless body crashed into Alderas, knocking the wind out of him and sending him sprawling to the forest floor. He managed to keep hold of his bow and scrambled to his feet as he drew another arrow, then he froze in horror as his gaze fell upon thing he had just killed. Its scarred and twisted face was frozen in a permanent expression of rage, its black eyes stared lifelessly back at Alderas. He had never seen a Darkspawn before, but he had heard enough tales from Zevran, Quinn and Feanor to know one when he saw one. Alderas felt his stomach churn: _They never travel alone,_ he thought. Just then another one of the creatures, this time a larger Hurlock, came careening into the ravine at a run. Alderas released his arrow and it struck the Hurlcok in the chest, but the thing just staggered and kept lurching forward, its heavy plate armor having absorbed most of the arrow’s impact. Alderas loosed again, this time striking the beast between the eyes, it slumped lifelessly to the ground. Alderas nocked another arrow and backed up, his eyes darting back and forth in a panic. All around him now the air was filled with growls and savage grunts coming from every direction. _They always travel in warbands..._ Another Darkspawn crested the ravine. Then another, and another, and another…Alderas picked one at random and shot his arrow, turned and sprinted away without waiting to see if it struck home. 

Alderas ran as swiftly and surely as a deer, dodging between trees and leaping gracefully over rocks and foliage. The Darkspawn behind him crashed through like a storm, barreling over anything in their path. And they were gaining on him. They were so fast, _how could they be so damn fast?_ Alderas heard them coming closer and closer, their howls rang in his ears, he felt hot breath on the nape of his neck…then he heard Zevran shout before he saw him.

“Duck!”

Alderas dropped into a forward roll as a dagger flew over his head and took the Genlock closest behind him right off its feet. When Alderas popped back up Feanor and Zevran were standing on either side of him in fighting stances with blades drawn. Alderas grinned as he drew another arrow.

“Glad to see you fellows,” he panted.

The appearance of the other two Elves and the sight of all three standing their ground seemed to startle the Darkspawn and they skidded to a halt. For several tense, drawn out seconds, the three Wardens stared down a dozen Darkspawn, separated by only a few feet. _This isn’t right,_ thought Feanor.

“Fall back,” he said, “Get back to the camp and the horses.” 

Alderas was the first to turn around and he immediately froze: More Darkspawn were pouring into the ravine behind them, blocking their path back to the camp.

“Not an option!” Alderas called as he kept his eyes on the new cluster of enemies. Feanor looked behind him and cringed, and saw more Darkspawn moving through the trees far to their left. They were cut off in three directions. Feanor jerked his head to the right, the only direction available to them.

“Go,” he shouted, “Move!”

The Elves quickly bounded up the embankment and sprinted into the woods, and the Darkspawn immediately gave chase.

The trio of Wardens engaged in a running battle with the Darkspawn for what felt like hours but was only a few minutes. _This isn’t right,_ Feanor thought again. These Darkspawn were not behaving like the ones he and Zev had faced during the Blight. Those creatures had always charged straight ahead, heedless of numbers or tactics, their one-track minds focused only on the kill. These Darkspawn were thinking. They held together in a relatively tight line, keeping to cover as they ran almost parallel to Feanor and his companions. Only when their quarry tried to veer off to the left or the right did they attack in small groups of five or six. Feanor and Zevran fought them off, fighting in tandem, anticipating each other’s moves as their blades whirled and parried in a dizzying display. It was more like a choreographed dance than a melee, and would have been beautiful if not for the carnage it wrought. Alderas stayed a few yards ahead, picking off any Darkspawn that broke from cover with precision, but he was already running low on his finite supply of arrows.

The sporadic attacks kept the Wardens running in a straight line, and each one took a small toll on Zev and Feanor. They were each bleeding from several minor wounds and breathed heavily. Feanor could feel his legs beginning to burn, and his eyes were stinging from the sweat and blood pouring into them. Throughout it all the persistent thought remained: _This isn’t right._ Too late to counter it, he realized what was happening: the Darkspawn were herding them. 

Feanor parried a sword slash with a dagger in one hand and opened the neck of his attacker with the dagger in his other. The Hurlock fell backwards gurgling, uselessly clutching at the gash in its neck. Feanor turned to continue running and saw it through the trees: A wall. Twenty feet high and stretching for dozens of yards in either direction, the ruined remains of some forgotten fortress or temple. Darkspawn were to the left, right, and in front of him now, the wall to his back. Zevran and Alderas noticed the predicament as well, and the three of them stopped running and clustered together as they slowly backed up toward the barrier. They were cornered animals.

“I have six arrows left, six,” Alderas gasped. His back was pressed against the stone wall, Zevran and Feanor were standing on either side and slightly in front of him. All three were panting heavily and covered in sweat and gore. The line of Darkspawn looped in a half circle around the Wardens. They were holding their positions, one or two of them occasionally lunging forward and gnashing their teeth and roaring before falling back into line. _Like dogs on a leash, waiting for their master to let them loose,_ Alderas thought. An image of his mother being torn to shreds by hounds flashed through his mind. Rage bubbled inside him, restoring some of his sapped strength. He grimly nocked another arrow.

“So,” Alderas said with an eerie calm, “How does this end?”

Zevran glanced over his shoulder with a grim look, “They kill us, rape us, and eat us. Hopefully in that order.”

“Make them earn it,” Feanor rasped. His jaw was set, his knuckles white around the hilts of his daggers. He smiled and had to chuckle at the irony: To have lived through Ostagar and fought against the Blight only to be discharged from the Grey Wardens, and now he was going to die fighting Darkspawn. Feanor could appreciate a good joke, even if it was made at the expense of his own life. “Make. Them. Earn it.”

Back at camp Quinn stood holding the reins of the horses in one hand and his great sword in the other, his face was twisted in agony.

“They’re getting farther away,” Brecca mumbled. The Dwarf was squatting down and rocking back and forth, staring forlornly into the forest. Quinn only grunted in response. The sounds of the fighting that had erupted only a few minutes earlier were indeed getting farther away. Quinn didn’t know what to do. Every nerve in his body, every instinct was telling him to charge into the forest, to go to the aid of his brothers. But Feanor had given him an order: _Someone needs to get back to Denerim, warn the others, the Black must survive._ Quinn knew this to be true, but…

That was his family out there.

Quinn gritted his teeth and cursed in frustration. _Andraste, please guide me,_ he thought, _Maker please send me a sign. I don’t know what to do…_

“Fuck this!” Brecca said and suddenly stood up. Quinn watched him in surprise as the Dwarf picked up his crossbow and slung a quarrel of bolts over his back.

“What are you doing?” Quinn asked.

“What does it look like? I’m going to save our friends,” he replied. “Are you coming?”

Quinn just stared at Brecca in shock for a moment, “But Feanor said…”

“I know what the fuck Feanor said,” Brecca fumed, “And if we live through this he can dock me two weeks’ pay. Now are you coming or are you going to stand there praying all day?”

Quinn’s mouth hung open as Brecca ran into the trees. He stood there alone for a moment before breaking into a robust laugh. He looked to the sky with a smile and winked, then he drew his sword and threw the scabbard to the side as he ran after Brecca.

The Darkspawn didn’t attack. They just stood there growling and raging, blocking the Wardens’ escape route but not rushing in to finish them off. The three Elves looked from the line back to each other in confusion.

“What the hell are they waiting for?” Alderas asked through clenched teeth.

Neither Feanor nor Zev answered. Alderas followed their gazes toward the center of the Darkspawn line, where the creatures were seeming to part for another one of their kind. This one was taller than a Hurlock with even broader shoulders and bigger arms. Its armor was not the hideous conglomeration of metal and bone of the common rank and file, but was actually ornate in a grotesque sort of way. It carried a bladed abomination of a Mage’s staff, and its black eyes gleamed with evil intelligence through the war paint on its face: Red war paint in the shape of a hand. Then something happened that Feanor didn’t think was possible: It spoke.

“This one has the honor of performing the will of the Red Hand.”

Breath caught in Feanor’s chest at the sound of the deep, otherworldly voice coming from the thing’s mouth.

“It’s talking,” Zevran said like he was mumbling in his sleep. “Feanor, why is that thing talking?”

Feanor had no answer, he could only stare in disbelief as the blighted creature continued:

“You are alive still only to hear this one’s words from the mouth of the Red Hand. Before you die, know this: Everything you have built, everything you love, everything you know in this world shall burn. Your brethren will die screaming, and all will be cleansed by the storm that is coming. The Red Hand prepares the way for the Master, to make his path straight. His path will be littered with the corpses of His enemies, and yours shall be amongst them. So speaks the Red Hand.”

“Tell your Red Hand to go fuck himself!” Alderas screamed in vicious defiance. Feanor had to laugh despite himself.

“If you want our lives,” Feanor said, his voice dripping with venom, “Come and take them.” 

The Darkspawn’s mouth twisted in some sort of mockery of a smile, a wretched cackle of what might have been laughter emanated from its throat.

“This one needs to come for nothing, “ it said. It raised its staff and wreathes of flame began to snake down the shaft. Feanor instinctively got his hands up in front of his face just in time.

The ball of mage-fire took him squarely in the chest. Feanor’s Drakeskin armor was resistant to anything short of Dragon flame itself, but not against the raw concussive force of magical energy. The explosion threw Alderas and Zevran to the sides and Feanor backwards. He slammed into the unyielding stone wall and felt his ribs crack on impact as all the air was forced out of his body. His head snapped backward violently, the base of his skull cracking against the rock. Stars exploded behind Feanor’s eyes as he slumped blindly to the ground.

His vision came back to him in swimming, swirling waves that made him gag. The ground all around him was scorched. Somewhere to his right Alderas was staggering to his feet like a drunk man, trying to pull his hunting knife from his boot. A few yards in front of him was Zevran, still clutching a dagger in one hand, swaying like a man on the deck of a bucking ship. Zevran’s back was to the Darkspawn, so he did not see when they charged.

Time slowed down. Feanor tried to get to his feet, but his legs gave out and he fell forward onto his stomach. Pain lanced through his ribs into his spine, and he became aware of a sticky wetness dripping down the back of his neck. Feanor looked up past Zevran to the Hurlock running at him with a wickedly curved blade. Feanor tried to get to his feet again, but now he could not even feel his legs. He tried to cry out, but his mouth couldn’t form the words.

“Z-z…Ze…” he croaked. The Hurlock was ten paces away.

Zevran finally stopped swaying, he blinked and shook his head, his deep brown eyes locked on Feanor’s bright green ones.

“Ze…Zev…Zevran!” Five paces.

Zevran’s eyes widened in realization. He pivoted gracefully on his heel and brought his dagger up to guard just as the Hurlock crashed into him. The force of impact drove the blade through Zevran’s leather armor and into his chest.

For a moment the two of them just stood there, locked in a deadly embrace. Zevran glanced down at the scimitar jutting from his torso with a look of bemusement, then into the cold dead eyes of the slavering Hurlock. With a scream of rage and pain, Zevran jammed his dagger through the bottom of the Darkspawn’s jaw into its neck. The thing stiffened and fell backward, pulling its blade from Zevran’s body with a sickeningly wet tearing sound. Zevran clasped his hands to the wound in his chest, blood spurted out from between his fingers. He slumped down to his knees and then collapsed onto his back, his entire body shaking with violent spasms.

A wordless, animalistic cry tore from Feanor’s throat. He dug his fingers into the earth and pulled with every ounce of strength left in him toward his beloved friend’s body. He saw another Darkspawn walking almost casually toward Zevran, twirling a double bladed axe in its hands. Feanor pulled harder, trying to beat the Darkspawn, to get between it and Zevran. He was too late. The Darkspawn lifted its axe over its head with a vicious howl.

The cry of triumph turned into one of pain and surprise as the Darkspawn’s back arched violently. It shuddered and fell to the side, a crossbow bolt buried between its shoulder blades. Feanor looked past it just in time to see Brecca disappear behind a tree as he reloaded his crossbow. Then the foliage erupted as Quinn burst forth, swinging his massive great sword in wide swooping arcs, cutting down any Darkspawn in his path like so much wheat before the scythe. He reached Zevran and stood astride him with his sword held high, roaring like a mother bear defending its wounded cub.

Quinn stood over Zevran’s prone form and took stock of the situation: It wasn’t good. It was hopeless. Zevran was bleeding to death, Feanor was out of the fight, Alderas was nowhere to be seen, and Brecca was racing from tree to tree, firing and reloading as he went. But the Dwarf had only a dozen bolts, and before Quinn stood at least three dozen Darkspawn.

_This is it,_ he thought, _this is how we die._ A dark thought crossed Quinn’s mind, of putting Zev and Feanor out of their miseries to spare them the Darkspawn, then racing to Denerim. Maybe he could outrun the Darkspawn and get to safety and then…the thought vanished as quickly as it had come. A feeling of calmness and certainty overcame Quinn, the same feeling he had felt in the prison mines so many years ago. He had felt it at Redcliffe, at Denerim, and when Feanor asked him to take the Black. Suddenly he knew: They would survive this. He didn’t know how, but he knew they would. He looked at the force of Darkspawn in front of him and smiled. Then he looked over his shoulder to Feanor lying on his stomach a few feet away, trying desperately to pull himself forward.

“The Maker loves you, Feanor,” Quinn shouted, “And so do I!”

With that Quinn raised his sword over his head and dove into the seething mass of Darkspawn.

Feanor’s entire world had shrunken down to the few feet between him and Zevran. He pulled himself forward, a few agonizing inches at a time, until finally he was at Zevran’s side. His friend’s chest was moving up and down rapidly, his breath coming in ragged gasps. Blood was flowing freely from the wound in his chest. Feanor pressed down on it hard with both hands to staunch the flow, but it kept coming out in jets.

“No…no…no…” Feanor mumbled like a man in a delusion, trying to will the blood to stop pouring out of his friend. Feanor felt a slick, trembling hand reach up and grab him behind the neck, and his head was pulled down a few inches away from Zevran’s. Zev’s eyes were wide and darted from side to side, tears streamed down his blood-smeared cheeks.

“Feanor…Feanor…?” Zevran quaked, his eyes unable to focus. Feanor cradled Zevran’s head in his arms. His eyes stopped darting and settled on Feanor’s.

“I’m here Zev, I’m here,” Feanor choked out between sobs.

“I’m so sorry Feanor…” Zevran gasped as new tears welled up in his eyes. His trembling hands grasped feebly at Feanor’s arms.

“Don’t let them take me,” Zevran said, “Don’t let them send me away. I won’t…I can’t…how will I know where to go without you?”

“We’ll go together, Zev,” Feanor assured him, each word was a dagger in his heart. “It’ll be a new adventure, you and me. The Fade won’t know what hit it.” Feanor held Zevran tightly to his chest, both of their bodies racked and convulsed with pain and sobs.

Then Feanor heard it, a rasping evil chuckle. He turned his head and saw the Darkspawn with the red hand war paint standing over them, its face contorted in a look of pure disgust as it stroked its staff. Feanor laid his body over Zevran’s and pulled a dagger from its sheath on his thigh. He held it up weakly, the blade shivering in his trembling hand.

“You will not touch him,” Feanor said through gritted teeth, “I swear by my own cursed blood you will not touch him.”

The Darkspawn levelled his staff a few inches from Feanor’s face.

“You have been weighed and measured,” it snarled. “This one has found you wanting.”

Feanor dropped his dagger and covered Zevran’s face with his body as fresh tendrils of flame creeped down the Darkspawn’s staff. He pressed his cheek against Zevran’s golden hair and closed his eyes tightly.

“I love you Zev,” he whispered.

For the second time Feanor was blinded by a flash. This time when his vision returned it was blurry around the edges, and the world around him had taken on a colorless, surreal quality. _Am I dead?_ He wondered. _Is this the Fade?_

Time slowed down again. The Darkspawn that had been standing over them was lying on its back a few feet away, its chest a smoking ruin. The air above him was hissing and whistling, and when Feanor looked up he saw that it was filled with arrows and lightning bolts, all falling among the ranks of the Darkspawn. Their savage howls turned into feral screams of fear, screams that were suddenly drowned out by a new sound: The rising war-cry of men. The ground beneath Feanor shook and the sound of thunder filled his ears. Warriors on horseback began streaming past him wielding swords and flails. Feanor watched in awe as they fell on the remaining Darkspawn with reckless abandon. Feanor smiled, he laughed. He wasn’t dead and this wasn’t the Fade, this was real.

“Zevran, Zevran look!” Feanor looked down and his heart sank. Zevran’s eyes were staring lifelessly upward, his arms had fallen limply from Feanor’s shoulders.

“No…” Feanor whispered. “No Zevran, no! Don’t do this! Zev come back, I need you to come back, Zev!”

Feanor had Zevran’s head cupped in his hands, sobbing and screaming in grief when the largest charger he had ever seen reared up next to him. Its rider was a giant, a giant with horns. The Qunari’s skin was the color of sand, his eyes an impossible shade of deep red. His horns curled around his ears and seemed to gleam in the sun as if plated with some precious metal. He leapt down from the charger with a grace that belied his size and the heavy plate armor he was wearing. He crouched down next to Feanor and Zevran, pushed Feanor aside and pressed his fingers up to Zevran’s neck. The Qunari raised his head and began shouting in some foreign tongue, waving urgently at something or someone in the distance.

Feanor was delirious, mumbling Zevran’s name, lying on his back staring up at the sky. He started as suddenly his vision was filled by an upside-down Dalish face staring intently at him. Feanor fell silent and marveled at the woman. Her face was covered by more tattoos than he had ever seen on an Elf, leaving hardly an inch of unmarked skin. The tattoos were a magnificent shade of sky-blue that matched the color of her eyes. Her head was shaved at the sides, leaving a crest of hair down the middle of her head that was also dyed blue and spiked straight up.

“Blue…” Feanor muttered in his delirium. The Dalish woman frowned, rested her hand on Feanor’s eyes and said something in her language. Darkness took him.

Feanor’s eyes fluttered open and he found himself staring up at the peaked ceiling of a large canvas tent. He was lying on a cot, his head propped up by pillows. He tried to sit up and felt a searing bolt of pain shoot through his head for his efforts. He fell back with a grunt, and heard the clinking of chain mail come to his side. Feanor looked up at the black cloaked human staring down at him. The man nodded as if in response to something Feanor had not said and quickly left through the front flap of the tent.  
Feanor looked at his surroundings and found that there was not much there. A stool and a small wooden table with a flickering lantern were the tent’s only features aside from the cot he was lying on. He raised one hand gingerly to his forehead and discovered it wrapped in thick bandages. He threw off his covers to find his ribs were likewise bandaged and he was wearing nothing but his smalls. He forced himself to sit up again with effort, groaning at the pain, he grabbed the covers and pulled them back up to his chest before collapsing back into the pillows. He laid there for several minutes, and the events of the day slowly creeped back into his memory. Fear and sorrow grasped his heart.

Zevran…

The flap opened again and the Qunari stepped into the tent and looked down at Feanor inquisitively. Even out of his plate armor he was something to behold. He was so tall the curve of his horns almost touched the tent’s peak, which had to be at least seven feet off the ground, if not more. Feanor opened his mouth to say something but only a croaking sound came out. The Qunari nodded and removed a canteen from his belt. He unscrewed the cap as he sat down in the stool at the head of Feanor’s cot. He held Feanor’s head up with one hand and tipped the canteen into his open lips with the other. The water was lukewarm, but it felt like heaven as it went down his throat. Feanor drank greedily until he had to stop to catch his breath. The Qunari set the open canteen at the edge of Feanor’s cot and settled back in his stool with his arms folded across his massive chest. Finally Feanor’s breathing calmed.

“Who…?” Feanor began before the Qunari cut him off.

“Captain Kaaras of the Valo Kas Free Company, at your service,” he said. Feanor nodded.

“My name is Feanor…”

“Yes, I know,” Kaaras cut him off again. “Your friends told me.”

“Zevran?” Feanor asked, his heart hammering in his chest. Kaaras regarded him coolly for a moment before nodding slowly.

“He nearly bled to death, but he’s alive,” Kaaras said, “Blue got to him just in time, had to use what mana she had left to heal him. She needs a few more hours of rest, then she can tend to the rest of your wounds. It’ll be days before you fully recover, but you’ll live.”

Relief swelled over Feanor, he put his hands to his eyes and let out something that was partially a sob and partially a laugh. He looked at Kaaras out of the corner of his eye.

“Blue? The Dalish woman with the tattoos?” Feanor asked.

“Yes,” Kaaras replied. “She is our resident Mage.”

“And her name is Blue?”

“That is what she calls herself, so that is what we call her.”

Feanor couldn’t suppress a laugh despite the ache it caused in his ribs.

“Because of the tattoos, and the eyes and the hair,” he chuckled.

“Yes I suppose so,” Kaaras said with a grin, but there was no mirth in it. Feanor’s own smile faded as he looked at the Qunari again. His eyes were downcast and he chewed his lower lip with a nervous expression. Feanor suddenly felt the fear rising in his gullet again.

“What is it?” he asked.

Kaaras regarded him for a moment before sighing and shaking his head.

“Your other man…he didn’t make it,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

Feanor stared at him blankly for a moment, not quite registering what Kaaras had just said. His whole body felt numb.

“Who?” he asked.

“The human. Your friends said his name was Quinn. He was already dead when we got to him.”

“Quinn?” Feanor asked, as if guessing the answer to a trick question. Kaaras just nodded.

“Quinn is dead?” he asked again.

“Yes,” Kaaras responded, looking at the ground awkwardly.

Feanor settled back onto the pillows and folded his hands on his chest. He felt blank, the words Kaaras had spoken just would not sink in. Silence stretched between them for several minutes.

“Your friends,” Kaaras began slowly, “They told me Quinn was a devout Andrastian. We don’t have a priest or anything like that, but we do have a chaplain of sorts who knows the funerary rites…if you think this Quinn would approve…”

“Yes,” Feanor answered quietly, “Quinn would approve.” 

Kaaras nodded, “I will make the arrangements,” he said, and then got up to leave.

“Kaaras?” Feanor asked. The Qunari stopped near the tent flap and looked over his shoulder.

“Did you see Quinn fall?” Feanor asked. Kaaras hesitated, then nodded slowly.

“From a distance, aye,” he said. Feanor had to swallow the lump in his throat before asking the next question.

“Was it a good death?” 

“Yes,” Kaaras said without hesitation, “It was a good death.”

Feanor nodded and allowed himself to sink all the way into the pillows.

“Thank you, Kaaras,” he said. The Captain looked surprised at the comment, but recovered himself and nodded before exiting the tent.

A few hours later, Blue came to Feanor’s tent and healed his wounds, and the next day they gathered around Quinn’s funeral pyre. The four Wardens stood at the front, each of them sporting several bandages. Zevran looked especially pale and had to be supported between Feanor and Alderas. None of them said anything to each other, there was nothing they could say. The chaplain performed the funerary rites in front of the pyre. When he asked Quinn’s friends if they had anything to say about the departed, none of them could find the right words. Feanor said something half-hearted about him being a good man, a good friend, and a good brother who sacrificed himself so that they could live. It sounded hollow to him, it didn’t do Quinn justice.

As the pyre was lit, Kaaras and the rest of his company, about fifty men and women in all who had attended out of respect filtered away quietly to go about their duties. The Black Wardens watched the flames in silence for a long time. Eventually Zevran ran out of strength, and as Alderas helped him walk back to his tent, his hand drifted down and gave Feanor’s a squeeze. Feanor returned it, but did not take his eyes from the flames. Brecca remained with him awhile longer before he sighed, wiped away his tears and rested a hand on Feanor’s shoulder for a moment and walked away. 

Feanor remained standing alone until the flames burned themselves out and only ashes remained. He watched the smoke curl up into the sky and get carried away on the wind. The numbness melted away, and he was overcome by a sadness he had thought he could no longer feel. Feanor fell to his knees, buried his face in the dirt, and wept.

_The Maker loves you, Feanor, and so do I._


	8. Homecoming

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> -The events of this chapter are concurrent with those of chapters six and seven.
> 
> -In another part of Thedas, agents of the Inquisition follow a trail that leads to the same plot the Black Wardens have been ensnared in.

The merchant galley made port in Kirkwall at midday in the midst of one of the Waking Sea’s infamous storms. The waters in the harbor were somewhat calmer, but the single-mast ship still rocked hard as its small crew struggled furiously to guide her safely into dock. All hands on deck scurried about in a flurry of activity, save for one. The hooded figure stood motionless on the swaying deck, seemingly oblivious to the choppy waves and persistent rain that pelted his leather cloak. His gaze was fixed on the slowly approaching city, a city still not healed. A city that might never be healed. Even from a distance, he could see the rubble cluttered in the streets and the scorched husks of ruined buildings. It was an apt metaphor for the people of Kirkwall themselves, he thought. Those who had survived the brutality were little more than shells of the people they had once been. Still, as the galley drew closer, signs of life could be seen. New buildings, strong and clean, stood out defiantly amidst the ruins as people moved furtively about the streets, trying to reenact a semblance of normal life. It was like watching a wounded man take his first careful steps after being bedridden. It was a sign of hope, perhaps. As if to validate the oddly optimistic thought, the rain and wind suddenly slackened and the sun peaked through the clouds for the first time in days. He lowered his hood and gazed up into the rays of the sun, and then back at the city which didn’t seem quite as bleak as it had moments ago, and allowed himself a private smile. Varric Tethras had come home. 

Longshoremen on the pier shouted the all-clear, and the galley’s crew began hurriedly unloading their cargo, eager for the warmth of fire, bed, and pleasurable company their time in port promised. Varric hoisted his rucksack over one shoulder and made his way to the vessel’s captain. The man was a swarthy, balding Antivan with a thick handlebar mustache, unconcerned with the fact that he was soaked head to toe. He stopped shouting orders as Varric approached and greeted him with a broad smile and an overly enthusiastic nod.

“Welcome to Kirkwall, Mister Smith,” the captain said. “Safe and on schedule, as promised.”

“You’re a gentleman and a scholar, Cap. Never doubted you for a second,” Varric said. He produced pouch of coins and tossed it to the captain who caught it deftly in one hand, tested its weight, and nodded before pocketing it. The cost of this voyage had not been cheap, the price to pay for speed and secrecy over comfort and safety. 

“We will be in port until the week is out,” the captain ventured. “If your business is concluded by then, you are welcome to accompany us back to Jaden. For a small fee, of course.”

“Uh huh,” Varric responded with a raised eyebrow. “Sorry, but my business is kind of…open ended, time wise. Not sure when I’ll be leaving. Besides, it’s been awhile since I’ve been home. Figured I’d see the sights, visit the family and whatnot.”

The captain’s brow furrowed in surprise. “You’re actually from Kirkwall?” he asked.

“Born and raised,” replied Varric.

“And…you came back?” asked the captain, with only the barest hint of sarcasm. Varric just shrugged and grinned.

“Strange times we live in, am I right?” Varric asked rhetorically, “When people willingly come back to Kirkwall, not to mention all the demons and shit.”

The two men shook hands and Varric made a few steps toward the gangplank before the captain cleared his throat and interrupted him.

“Ahem…your companion, Mister Smith?” Varric turned with a defeated sigh.

“You caught me,” he said. “I was gonna try and leave him on your hands. You’re not in the market for another crewmember, are you?”

“Not that one,” the captain snorted. “I imagine he’d last ten minutes before finding himself swimming back to Jaden.”

Varric chuckled and waved the captain off and headed below deck to a small storage closet that served as a makeshift passenger cabin. He tapped lightly on the door before opening it a crack.

“Hey Sparkles, you alive in there?” Varric called. A miserable groan from under a pile of blankets answered him.

“Up and at em!” Varric said enthusiastically. “I have so many wonderful things to show you in my hometown!”

Dorian Pavus sat up slowly from under the blankets, his palms pressed to his temples. The Mage looked miserable. His hair was a matted mess, there were intense dark circles under his eyes, and his skin was actually a light shade of green. Varric couldn’t repress a smile. The man was always so damn pretty, even in the wilds fighting demons and Venatori he seemed to never get dirty or even sweat. But ten minutes on rough waters had reduced the normally unflappable Dorian to hurling his guts into the sea and begging the Maker for a swift death. Varric was quite fond of Dorian, but he was also fond of laughing at the expense of his friends, which the Dwarf now did as he clapped his hands and encouraged Dorian to sally forth.

“Please,” said Dorian dryly, “Just never stop talking. Ever.”

“Deal,” said Varric. “Now come on. You got five minutes to get off this tub before the captain tosses you off.”

“Oh just let him,” moaned Dorian. “I’m done for.”

Varric rolled his eyes and left. The sea sickness was for real, but the pity party was just a show. Varric had seen the man fight off Red Templars for an entire day with an arrow in his ribs, he’d manage a little nausea just fine. 

Sure enough, Varric only had to wait a few minutes before Dorian joined him on the dock. He looked about uneasily, a man very obviously out of his element. Not only was he feeling unwell, but he was dressed, like Varric, in the garb of a common tradesman: A worn leather travelling cloak over a rough woolen tunic, faded breeches and scuffed work boots. Varric imagined the clothes bothered Dorian as much as his sour stomach, if not more. He also didn’t have his staff. He did not need one to be dangerous, but Dorian was clearly uneasy about not having his weapon of choice close at hand. There was nothing to be done about it, however. To say that the people of Kirkwall were not exactly endeared to Mages would be the understatement of the century, and the Venatori had everyone in Thedas feeling even more wary of Tevinters than usual. So a Tevinter Mage traipsing around town in Dorian's usual opulent finery was simply out of the question. 

“So,” Varric said, in an attempt to snap Dorian out of his uneasy silence, “This is Kirkwall. What do you think?”

“It’s…absolutely charming,” Dorian replied, looking like he had swallowed something unpleasant. “Now that I’m seeing it with my own eyes, a great many things about you are beginning to make more sense.”

“I’ll pretend that’s not an obvious back handed compliment,” said Varric.

Dorian managed a weak chuckle and then wrinkled his nose. “Maker’s breath, Varric, what is that smell?”

“Well, it isn’t the Maker’s breath, I can tell you that much,” Varric said with a rakish grin and a nudge to Dorian’s ribs. Dorian just looked at him incredulously. 

“Seriously though, it’s shattered dreams. And the bodies they haven’t found yet,” Varric said, suddenly quite solemn.

“I see,” said Dorian, shifting uncomfortably and adjusting the pack on his back. Try as he might to hide it under his mask of elitism, the man possessed a deep well of sympathy for the less fortunate. The pair began weaving their way through the bustling yet subdued crowd away from Kirkwall’s docks and toward the inner city. If Dorian felt uncomfortable and out of place on the docks, he was in for a much ruder awakening once they reached their final destination. It was the territory of rogues and undesirables; shady merchants, bards, smugglers, and those were the nicer sort. The Coterie, Carta, Antivan Crows, Black Wardens, Red Jennies, all had carved out territories and spheres of influence in Kirkwall. Varric was used to dealing with those kinds of people, Dorian was not. But the Mage had other talents and knowledge that were vital for their mission.  
The Inquisition had little real military or political presence in the Free Marches, but it did have a fairly decent network of spies and informants. Over the past several weeks, reports had begun arriving at Skyhold of an alarming influx of Tevinters in almost every free city, Kirkwall included. The Tevinters had been arriving under innocent enough auspices; merchants, tradesmen, refugees from Seheron, mercenary companies selling their services to Marcher Viscounts and nobles. The Vints were so innocent that Leliana’s agents were convinced they were actually a Venatori vanguard. That suspicion seemed to be confirmed once the reports became less and less frequent before ceasing entirely. The Inquisition had not heard from any of its Free Marches agents in over two weeks. Considering how easily the Venatori had infiltrated Redcliffe and virtually enslaved the rebel Mages only a few months prior, there was real cause for alarm. What the fanatics were playing at now, anyone could only guess.

So Varric had been sent back home to find out via his own spy network and determine what had become of the Inquisition agents and, if possible, determine what the Venatori were up to. The Seeker had been loath to send Varric alone. For his own safety, she insisted. The look on her face when the Inquisitor assigned Dorian to accompany him had been priceless. Her distrust of both of them, despite the fact they had shed blood for the Inquisition, was well known. But who better, the Inquisitor had argued with a wink and a nod, to uncover a Tevinter plot in Kirkwall than a well-connected native and an experienced Tevinter Mage? Who better, indeed?

Varric knew a fellow surface Dwarf named Gavin that served as a go-between for the Dwarven Merchant’s Guild and the local Carta clan. Gavin was well liked and respected by the leadership of both sides, and so had long been off limits as far as any kind of retaliation or intimidation. Varric had utilized the man before, he had always proven to be trustworthy and reliable, as far as spies went. He had sent Gavin a message in advance of their arrival and received a response just before departing Jaden agreeing to a meet up at the usual spot; a rickety tavern patronized exclusively by the spies, smugglers, sell-swords and general bottom feeders of Kirkwall. It took about an hour of walking through the narrow back alleys and side streets to find the place, which was literally a hole in the wall covered by a thick blanket. If you didn’t know it was there, you’d walk right past it. Varric and Dorian stepped inside and walked down several flights of stairs into a dimly-lit cellar that served as the tavern.

It was dank and smelled musty, but was surprisingly crowded. Not a few hushed conversations ceased as small groups of rough looking patrons eyed Varric and Dorian suspiciously before returning to their drinks. Varric looked around the tavern and frowned.

“Something’s wrong,” he said.

“Really?” replied Dorian, “In such a cozy and inviting place…”

Varric cut him off, “He’s not here.”

“Oh,” said Dorian, “Perhaps he’s just late?”

“Gavin’s never late,” said Varric.

Varric lead Dorian across the room and sat down in an empty booth. He felt under the table for a few moments before hearing barely audible click, and removed a small metal tube from the hidden compartment. Varric worked the small combination lock, opened the tube and removed a small parchment. His eyes scanned the writing and his frown deepened. Dorian looked over his shoulder, the parchment seemed to just contain a few lines of gibberish and a crude drawing. Before Dorian could ask what it meant, Varric held it over the candle on the table and watched it burn to ashes before standing up and dusting off his hands.

“Let’s go,” Varric said. Dorian just nodded and followed Varric back up to street level.

“What was that all about?” Dorian asked once they were topside.

“That message was from Gavin,” Varric sighed, “He said it’s not safe to talk here, wants us to meet him tonight at a spot outside the city. This is bad.”

“Why?” Dorian asked, “If he has sensitive information, he probably just wants to meet in a safer place.”

“That’s just it,” said Varric, “That tavern is one of the safest places in Kirkwall for people like us, its neutral ground. Doesn’t matter what faction you belong to or who you’re working for, people can meet there and do business and know they don’t have to worry about a knife in the back.” 

Dorian frowned as he mulled over Varric’s words. “So it’s a trap.” It was a statement, not a question.

“Yes,” said Varric.

Dorian nodded. “So, what do we do?”

“We have to meet him,” Varric said, clearly not thrilled at the prospect. “Something’s going on here, and we’re the only ones who can find out what it is, and it could be weeks before I can dig up information from another contact, time is a luxury we don’t have.”

Dorian nodded slowly, his face grim. “I wish I had my staff,” he said.

“Yeah,” replied Varric, “Me too.”

A few hours after dark Dorian and Varric were making their way through the hallways of a manor a few miles outside of Kirkwall. At least it had once been a manor, now it was a desiccated ruin long since picked clean by scavengers. Dorian noted the scorch marks on the wall, the bits of bone, armor and weapons too damaged to be worth anything scattered haphazardly about. He absently turned over a battered shield with his boot and stared at the Templar sword emblazoned on the front. People had died here, a lot of people.

Varric walked a few paces ahead with Bianca slung over his shoulder, casting his eyes about nervously. It was far too quiet, even for a place like this. After wandering the halls for what seemed like an eternity, the pair exited into an open space that used to be the manor’s courtyard. Vegetation was already beginning to reclaim the ruin here. In the middle of the courtyard under a gnarled and twisted tree was a horse with a rider sitting atop it, his eyes downcast. Varric paused and squinted in the darkness, recognizing the rider as Gavin.

“That’s him,” Varric whispered.

Dorian’s hackles were raised, every instinct told him they shouldn’t be here.

“Varric...” he began.

“Too late to turn back now,” Varric said. He took a few cautious steps out of the shadows into the courtyard. “Gavin?” he called, just loud enough to be heard.  
Gavin’s head snapped up, his eyes wide with fear.

“Varric! Run!” he shouted. The horse startled and sprinted forward out from underneath Gavin, leaving the Dwarf dangling several feet off the ground from a rope around his neck.

“Varric, don’t!” Dorian shouted, but it was too late. Varric sprinted over to the tree and grabbed Gavin’s kicking legs, lifting him up, trying to relieve the pressure of the rope around his neck.

“Varric…” Gavin managed to choke out, “Imperium…” his ragged voice was cut off as his chest was peppered with arrows.

“No!” Varric screamed. He released Gavin’s limp body, snapping Bianca’s arms out into their firing position as a dozen armed figures materialized from the shadows. Dwarves in distinctive Carta coats and humans. Varric started firing bolts at anything that moved.

Dorian watched in horror as the scene unfolded. He gritted his teeth and felt the mana surge through him. His eyes flashed and balls of fire ignited in his open palms. He shouted words in ancient Tevinter, and suddenly a wall of fire sprang from the ground between Varric and his attackers. Some did not stop in time and ran into the blaze, igniting themselves instantly. They fell to the ground writhing in pain, unable to scream as the flame sucked the air from their lungs. Dorian dashed forward and grabbed Varric by the collar.

“We need to go,” he yelled, “Now!”

Varric shuddered like he was about to vomit and nodded, the two sprinted out of the courtyard back the way they had come. As they retreated Dorian looked over his shoulder and caught a clear glimpse of one of the humans trying to bat the flames down. The man’s armor, the insignia on his chest…

_No…_ thought Dorian, _It can’t be…_

The two men sprinted through the darkness as fast as they could, off the road and into the forest. Varric pulled several vials from his pouch and flung them behind them as they ran. The vials shattered on impact, spreading a potion that dissolved any tracks or signs of their passing. Finally the two stopped running, they doubled over gasping for breath.

“Carta bastards,” Varric hissed, “Fucking Carta bastards! Smuggling is one thing, but outright throwing in with the Venatori!?”

“It’s worse than that,” Dorian said, “Those men, they were not Venatori.”

“What the hell do you mean they weren’t Venatori?” Varric demanded. Before Dorian could respond, both men heard sounds of commotion being carried on the wind, coming from the direction of Kirkwall.

“What is that?” Dorian asked.

Varric didn’t respond but began creeping through the wood. They moved silently toward the city, the sounds becoming clearer and more distinct as they approached. Screams, explosions, steel clashing against steel. The sounds of battle. The forest thinned and they stopped dead in their tracks, staring down into Kirkwall.

“Maker…no,” Varric whispered, “Please not again…”

Kirkwall was burning. Explosions of flame and electricity shattered the night sky, and even from here groups of armed men could be seen fighting in the streets. The sights horrified Varric, he cursed and began heading toward the city but Dorian grabbed his shoulders and spun him around.

“Varric no!” Dorian said, barely keeping his own panic in check. “We can’t, there’s no way out in that direction and we need to get back to Skyhold and tell them what’s happened!”

“Tell them what’s happened!?” Varric shouted as he pushed Dorian’s hands off him, “Those are Venatori down there! It’s Redcliffe all over again, we need to help!”

“It’s not Redcliffe all over again and those are not Venatori!” Dorian snapped.

Varric shook his head incredulously. “What the hell are you talking about?” he demanded.

“Those humans at the manor, the ones who attacked us with the Carta, they were wearing the armor of Imperial legionnaires!” Dorian said. Varric’s face went blank, he just stared at Dorian.

“Soldiers of the Imperium itself,” Dorian continued grimly. “Varric, this isn’t a Venatori plot. This is an invasion.”

Varric felt his heart sink as Dorian’s words sank in. He stared back out at Kirkwall and suddenly everything made sense: He knew the scene playing out in front of him was happening in every city in the Free Marches.

“Maker help us,” he muttered.

“I don’t think he cares anymore,” Dorian replied.

The Black Warden safe house in Kirkwall’s High Town was burning. Malcolm pulled himself to his feet, clutching the gash in his stomach. The attack had come without warning, sounds of fighting in the streets had begun only moments before the enemy burst through the door. Some Malcolm recognized as Carta and Antivan Crows, the rest must have been mercenaries. Malcolm surveyed the carnage around him, his brothers and sisters all lay dead on the ground. They had taken many of their attackers with them, but now only Malcolm was left. He had been the leader of their cell, and he had failed them all, but he would join them soon. He could feel himself bleeding out. He slumped back down to his knees and was racked by a fit of coughing, blood spurted from his mouth and his vision went blurry. When it cleared he saw a pair of black boots in front of him. He looked up at a giant of a man standing in front of him, wearing strange black armor and a faceless mask with only a slit where the eyes should be. The man held a sword dripping with blood in one hand, the other slowly reached up and removed the mask.

The last thing Malcolm saw was the grinning face of a Darkspawn, painted with red war paint in the shape of a hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspiration Music: Rey's Theme by John Williams (aka: "Return to Kirkwall")
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65As1V0vQDM


	9. Death Wish: Brecca

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brecca reveals demons from his past and struggles to find purpose in the wake of Quinn's death.

_Do you hear that? That is the sound of the inevitable. The sound of death. Everyone dies, often in gruesome and terrible ways, and that is life’s only certainty, the inevitable. Most people who deal in death the way that I do will tell you that the idea of our own deaths doesn’t much frighten us. But you never really get used to the idea that someday, the inevitable will come for your friends. One day, you’ll wake up and someone who has been there next to you day in and day out will just be…gone. It leaves you with an eerie, empty feeling, having to stare mortality in the face like that. It’s like having to read a book with a horrible ending over, and over, and over again. You know how it will end, but those last few pages always hit you right in the gut._

_So we all have to develop our own coping mechanisms, you know? Something to numb the pain, distract you from the grim certainty that one by one, all of your friends are going to go down that same path. More importantly, you need something to stave off that wish you keep hidden in the darkest compartments of your heart: That you will die before them. It’s an ugly thing born of despair, and unless you make the conscious decision to overcome it, it will destroy you.  
How do you block out something like that? How can you keep doing what you need to do in the face of the inevitable? I know what works for me, but it doesn’t work for everyone:_

_Become inevitable._

The Black Wardens spent the next several days in the camp of the Valo Kas, recovering from their wounds and coming to terms with their loss. Brecca and Alderas had gotten off relatively light with little more than flesh wounds, but Feanor and Zevran had both been on death’s doorstep with one foot across the threshold. The Hurlock’s blade had missed Zevran’s heart by mere centimeters, and Feanor had suffered a half dozen internal injuries, any one of which could have been his end. Without magical aid, both Feanor and Zevran would have died. But magic could only do so much, especially with wounds as grievous as theirs. Only time would complete the healing process, and so the Black Wardens waited. 

The loss of Quinn weighed more heavily on all of them than any wound. The three Elves found solace in each other’s’ company, spending many of their waking hours quietly chatting and training as much as their bodies would allow. After their evening meals they would gather around a lantern in the tent the Valo Kas had provided them to plan their next move.

Brecca never joined them in any of these activities. He ate little and spoke less, spending his time wandering aimlessly about the camp and the surrounding woods, or sitting by himself and staring blankly into space. His comrades took notice. On the first day they simply let him be, Brecca had always been prone to bouts of melancholy, and they hoped his silence was simply a natural response to his friend’s death. By the third day, Brecca had still said nothing, and Feanor and Zevran were beginning to worry.

“He has the look,” Zevran commented over their morning meal, Feanor nodded and grunted in response. Alderas looked over his shoulder, following Zevran’s eyes to where Brecca sat alone on a bench near the sparing grounds, staring at the rising sun.

“What look?” Alderas asked.

“The thousand-yard stare,” Feanor replied, “The look of a man who’s seen too much and just…snapped.”

Alderas furrowed his brow, “Snapped?” he asked, “That’s a bit harsh, he’s just sad is all.”

“There is sad, and then there is this,” Zevran said, “This is something else entirely. You’re young, Alderas, and your only comrades have been us, so you have not seen it yet…or experienced it. I’ve seen brave men and women who reach a point where they have seen too much death, too many horrors, and something inside them just…breaks. They shut down completely, oblivious to everything except whatever it is they’re staring at in the distance, something only they can see.”

“Some people call it ‘the old soldier’s disease,’” Feanor continued, “It’s like a wasting sickness, only in your head,” he paused and swirled the remainder of his porridge around in his wooden bowl, “Eventually, it kills you, one way or another. Maybe one day you’re in a fight and you just decide not to block a dagger you see coming, or maybe you just lay down and…wait.”

Alderas looked back over his shoulder at Brecca, then back to his companions. His eyebrow was raised in skepticism, “So wait, are you saying that Brecca’s dying?” he asked nervously. Feanor and Zevran just looked at each other.

“He’s standing on the brink with one leg dangling over the edge, staring into the abyss,” Zevran said. “Either we pull him back, or he will fall in.”  
Zevran stood, wincing a bit in pain. His chest and shoulder were still heavily bandaged. He headed toward the open flap of the tent.

“Or we teach him to embrace it,” Feanor said without looking up. Zevran paused and looked at Feanor with an unreadable expression before heading out into the morning light.

“What do you mean ‘embrace it’?” Alderas asked. Feanor looked at the younger Elf with his hard emerald eyes, and Alderas felt an involuntary chill run down his spine. 

Zevran crossed the yard and sat down next to Brecca, all too aware of the pain that shot through his chest every time he moved. He would live with that pain forever, few so deeply wounded by a blighted blade ever fully recovered. For the moment, he put it out of his mind and greeted Brecca. The Dwarf didn’t respond, or give any sign he even knew Zevran was there. They sat in silence for several minutes before Zevran spoke.

“Are you still with us, Brecca?” Zevran asked.

“Yes,” he replied, his voice barely above a whisper. Then he looked at the ground and shook his head. “No, I don’t know.”

“We need you, Brecca,” Zevran said with a frown, “You must shake off this despondency and rejoin us. We are all grieving, but what you are doing to yourself, this is no way to live.”

“You don’t need me,” Brecca said quietly, staring blankly at the ground. Zevran looked at him incredulously. 

“What an insane thing to say, of course we need you. You…”

“No, you don’t,” Brecca said, cutting Zevran off, “You need Quinn.”

“Quinn is dead, Brecca,” Zevran said, sounding a bit more harsh than he intended, “You are not.” Brecca chuckled mirthlessly at the words.

“Yeah, and how fucked up is that?” he asked sardonically. Zevran just stared at him, at a loss for words. Brecca sighed as he stood and paced a few feet away.

“By what right did I walk out of there, Zev?” he asked quietly. “Quinn was a warrior, like you and Feanor and Alderas, strong and brave and skilled. Me? I’m just a duster who can barely shoot a crossbow straight. But he’s dead, and I’m not. By what right?”

Zevran was silent for a moment, beginning to understand a bit of what Brecca was feeling: Survivor’s guilt.

“It could have been any one of us,” Zevran said gently, “It was almost all of us.”

“But it wasn’t,” Brecca replied, “It was one of us. And it should have been me, but it wasn’t. Again.” Zevran was about to reply with another counter argument, but Brecca’s last word suddenly peaked his attention.

“Again?” Zevran asked, “What do you mean again?” Brecca was silent for a long while. He looked at Zevran and then back out at the horizon.

“I lied to you,” Brecca said, “About what happened to my family. I told you all that I was gone when the guards came for them, all those years ago. That when I got back, they were already dead…but they weren’t. When I came back, the guards had just arrived and were dragging my family into the street. I knew what was happening, guards wearing the armor of a noble house. I had a short sword with me, everyone in Dust Town carried one. I put my hand on the hilt and then…I just stood there and watched from behind a merchant’s cart. I watched while they set fire to our home and our shop. My father was raging like a bull, it took three men just to hold him down. They made him watch his life go up in flames. My mother was screaming and trying to get to my brother and sister, they were crying, they were just children. The guards wouldn’t even let my mother hold them. Then they executed…murdered them, one by one. The children first, then my mother, then my father. Then the guards just walked away, left their bodies in the street. And the whole time I just stood there…watching. And I kept watching while passers-by checked their corpses for anything valuable, and when the scavengers started rooting through our home after the flames died out. I watched them lie there in the street all day, until their bodies were finally tossed into the death cart and rolled away to be dumped into the forges and incinerated. I just watched, Zevran, I stood there and watched it all.”

Tears began to well up in Brecca’s eyes, he took a deep breath to stifle the sobs. Zevran just stared at him, taken aback by what he was hearing.

“I saw Quinn die too, you know,” Brecca continued. “I was maybe a dozen yards away, no more. I saw him charge the Darkspawn, that big crazy bastard, he must have taken down five of them before they even realized what was happening. But once they did…they stabbed him a dozen times, they kept stabbing him even after he was dead. Some of them…some of them started eating him Zevran…”

Brecca’s body racked with a sob and he doubled over and began weeping openly. Zevran just watched him coolly until he recovered himself enough to continue speaking.

“I was the only one left standing on the field besides Quinn. I could have helped him, I could have rushed to his side. Maybe, just maybe I could have bought him a few extra seconds, that’s all he would have needed, a few more seconds before the Valo Kas rode in. And maybe I would have died but I would have died standing side by side with my friend, and that’s more than I deserve. And maybe he would be here now instead of me. But he isn’t, because I just stood there and watched.”

Brecca ran both his hands through his dirty blonde hair and grimaced as though he was trying to pull it all out by the roots.

“I should have died years ago with my family. And I should have died days ago, and maybe gotten some restitution, some penance for my sins. But I didn’t, I just stood and watched. Because I’m a coward, Zev. The Black Wardens don’t need cowards, do they? It should have been me, Zev, it should have been me.”

Brecca dropped to his knees, struggling just to keep from wailing aloud. Zevran watched him for several minutes, his face blank. Finally when Brecca had quieted somewhat, Zevran stood, walked over to his prone friend, got down on his knees and took him by the shoulders, forcing Brecca to meet his steely gaze. 

“You were a coward, Brecca,” Zevran said simply. The words seemed to shock the Dwarf back to his senses, and he stared at Zevran dumbly. 

“As far as I see it, you have two choices, both end with this,” Zevran drew a dagger, held it up in front of Brecca’s face and then dropped it to the ground in front of him. Brecca stared at the dagger as Zevran got to his feet and dusted off his hands.

“You can pick up that dagger, walk into the woods, and use it to escape your disgrace by dying in the same dust into which you were born,” Zevran said coldly. “Or, you can pick it up and use it for what it was meant for. Somewhere out there is the man responsible for Quinn’s death. We are going to kill this man. You can help us, and in so doing honor Quinn’s sacrifice and redeem yourself for the murder of your family. The choice is yours.”

With that, Zevran turned his back and began walking away. Before he had gotten a few steps Brecca’s voice stopped him.

“Zevran…”

Zevran turned to see Brecca holding the dagger in front of him. The hollow look was gone from his eyes, replaced by something Zevran had never seen there before: A deadly resolve.

“I want to help you kill the Red Hand,” Brecca said in an eerily calm voice. Zevran nodded slowly.

“Will you help me?” asked Brecca, “Will you teach me how to use this?”

“Yes,” said Zevran quietly, “I will teach you. Meet me here at sunrise tomorrow, and I will teach you how to not be a coward.”

Brecca nodded, stood up slowly, and slid the dagger into his belt. Zevran turned and walked back to the tent. Feanor was sitting outside with his feet propped up on a stool, Alderas sat next to him on the ground stringing his bow. 

“Well?” Feanor asked stoically.  
Zevran paused and looked at Feanor, then back across the field toward Brecca, who was once again sitting on the bench and staring at the horizon.   
“He’s embracing it,” Zevran said, “He is a killer now.”

Alderas couldn’t hide his surprise at Zevran’s words. Gentle Brecca, a killer? Just like that? He opened his mouth to speak, then promptly shut it when he saw the expressions on Feanor and Zevran’s faces. The two men were looking at each other, and for just a moment, they looked so very sad.


End file.
